American Revolution: The Essential Reference Guide 1440876517, 9781440876516

Citation preview

American Revolution

American Revolution THE ESSENTIAL REFERENCE GUIDE

Spencer C. Tucker, Editor

Copyright © 2021 by ABC-CLIO, LLC All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Tucker, Spencer, 1937- editor. Title: American Revolution: the essential reference guide / Spencer C. Tucker, editor. Description: Santa Barbara, California : ABC-CLIO, [2021] | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2020036237 (print) | LCCN 2020036238 (ebook) | ISBN 9781440876516 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781440876523 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: United States—History—Revolution, 1775-1783. | United States—History—Revolution, 1775-1783—Sources. Classification: LCC E208 .A436 2021 (print) | LCC E208 (ebook) | DDC 973.3—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020036237 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020036238 ISBN: 978-1-4408-7651-6 (print)     978-1-4408-7652-3 (ebook) 25 24 23 22 21  1 2 3 4 5 This book is also available as an eBook. ABC-CLIO An Imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC ABC-CLIO, LLC 147 Castilian Drive Santa Barbara, California 93117 www.abc-clio.com This book is printed on acid-free paper Manufactured in the United States of America

For Dr. William Sayre in grateful appreciation for his excellent care of the Tuckers.

Contents

List of Entries, ix List of Documents, xi Preface, xiii Causes of the American Revolution, xv Course of the American Revolution, xix Consequences of the American Revolution, xxix A–Z Entries, 1 Primary Documents, 249 Chronology, 285 Bibliography, 293 About the Editor and Contributors, 299 Index, 303

vii

List of Entries

Adams, John Adams, Samuel Arnold, Benedict Articles of Confederation Artillery, Land Artillery, Naval Bennington, Battle of Bonhomme Richard versus Serapis Boston, Siege of Boston Massacre Boston Tea Party Brandywine, Battle of Bunker Hill, Battle of Burgoyne, John Camden Campaign and Battle Canada Expedition Carleton, Sir Guy Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, British Siege of Cherry Valley Massacre, New York Chesapeake, Second Battle of the Clark’s Illinois Campaign Clinton, Sir Henry Coercive Acts Constitution of the United States Continental Army Continental Navy Conway Cabal Cornwallis, Charles, 1st Marquess Cowpens, Battle of Dan River, Race to the

Declaration of Independence Declaratory Act Flintlock Musket Fort Stanwix, New York, Siege of France and the American Revolutionary War Franklin, Benjamin Gage, Thomas Gates, Horatio George III, King of Great Britain Germain, Lord George German Forces Germantown, Battle of Grasse-Tilly, François-Joseph-Paul, Comte de Greene, Nathanael Guilford Courthouse, Battle of Howe, Richard, 1st Earl Howe Howe, William, 5th Viscount Jefferson, Thomas Jones, John Paul Kings Mountain, Battle of Knox, Henry Knyphausen, Wilhelm, Freiherr von Innhausen und Lafayette, Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lee, Charles Lexington and Concord, Battles of Lincoln, Benjamin Linear Tactics Logistics, British

ix

| List of Entries x Logistics, Patriot Long Island, Battle of Militias, Loyalist and Patriot Monmouth, Battle of Morgan, Daniel Musketry Newburgh Conspiracy North, Frederick, 2nd Earl of Guilford Paine, Thomas Quartering Act Quebec, Siege and Battle of Rhode Island Campaign and Battle of Rhode Island Saratoga Campaign Schuyler, Philip

Slavery Steuben, Friedrich von Sullivan-Clinton Expedition against the Iroquois (1779) Tarleton, Banastre Treaty of Paris Trenton, New Jersey, Battle of Valcour Island, Battle of Valley Forge, Pennsylvania Vimeur, Jean-Baptiste Donatien de, Comte de Rochambeau Washington, George Wayne, Anthony Women Yorktown Campaign

List of Documents

1. Declaratory Act (1766) 2. The Townshend Acts (1767) 3. Newspaper Account of the Boston Massacre (1770) 4. “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death” (1775) 5. Thomas Gage’s Report on Battle of Lexington-Concord (1775) 6. Continental Congress Resolution Regarding the Continental Army and George Washington (1775) 7. Royal Proclamation Declaring the Colonies in Rebellion (1775) 8. Declaration of Independence (1776) 9. George Washington’s Letter to John Augustine Washington (1776) 10. The American Crisis (1776) [Excerpts] 11. Benjamin Rush to Patrick Henry (1778) 12. British Southern Strategy (1779) 13. Impact of the West Indies on British Strategy (1779) 14. Prison Narrative of Ebenezer Fox (1779) [Excerpt] 15. Congressional Report on Morristown (1780) 16. Treaty of Paris (1783)

xi

Preface

The American Revolution, also known as the American War of Independence or American Revolutionary War of 1775–1783, saw 13 of Great Britain’s North American colonies achieve independence. Certainly, the war was one of the most important events in world history. This single-volume encyclopedia begins with introductory essays on the causes, course, and consequences of the American War of Independence. Following these are 85 entries treating the principal political and military figures involved as well as the major battles and military campaigns. Other entries cover logistics (a major factor in war), major weapons systems, treaties, slavery, the role played by France,

militia forces, and women. The end matter includes a selective bibliography and chronology of events as well as 16 primary documents totaling more than 19,000 words. It was a difficult task to decide just what to include in a work of 150,000 words. I hope that the reader will not be disappointed with the selections and that this single volume will serve as a useful aid to students, professors, and those simply interested in learning more about the men and events that set in motion a great experiment in representative government and the establishment of what would come to be seen as a beacon of hope and opportunity for much of the rest of the world. Spencer C. Tucker

xiii

Causes of the American Revolution

Separated by both 3,000 miles of ocean and dissimilar circumstances, it was inevitable that differences in outlook would arise between the ruling class in Britain and the inhabitants of British North America. Statesmen in London did not understand this, and even when they did, they made little or no effort to reconcile the differences. The communities on each side of the Atlantic had been growing apart for some time, but the crushing British victory over France in the French and Indian War (1754– 1763) removed the French threat and gave free play to the forces working for separation. Almost immediately after the war, in 1763, Chief Pontiac of the Ottawa Indians led an intertribal Native American alliance in a rebellion along the western frontier. British regulars put it down, but in these circumstances, London decided to station 10,000 regulars along the frontier and require the Americans to pay part of their upkeep. The plan seemed fair, especially as the mother country was hard-pressed for funds following the heavy expenditures of the French and Indian War and the concurrent Seven Years’ War (1756–1763) and because the soldiers would be protecting the colonials from both Indian attack and any French resurgence. This decision, however, ignited a long controversy about Parliament’s right to tax.

Apart from import duties (much of which were evaded through widespread smuggling), Americans paid only those few taxes assessed by their own colonial legislatures. By the same token, Americans did not have any direct representation in the British Parliament. Parliament’s effort began with the American Duties Act of April 1764, commonly known as the Sugar Act. Although it lowered the duty on foreign molasses, the act imposed the duty on all sugar or molasses regardless of its source. The Stamp Act of 1765 was a levy on all paper products. Reaction was such that the act was repealed the next year, as was the Sugar Act. Generally unnoticed in the excitement over the repeal was the Declaratory Act of March 1766. It asserted Parliament’s right to bind its American colonies “in all cases whatsoever.” The next effort by Parliament to find some tax that the colonials would pay came in the Townshend Acts of 1767. These imposed customs duties on glass, lead, paint, paper, china earthenware, silk, and tea imported from Britain into the colonies. According to Chancellor of the Exchequer Charles Townshend, the revenues raised would be applied to help pay the salaries of royal governors and judges as well as the cost of defending the colonies. But the act xv

xvi | Causes of the American Revolution

was clearly an attempt to make British officials independent of colonial legislatures to enable them to enforce parliamentary authority. In March 1770, it too was repealed after colonial protests, except for the tax on tea. The colonists’ primary complaint was that Parliament had no right to levy internal taxes against them because they had no representation in that body. Tensions between colonists and British soldiers also had been rising. This was in part for economic reasons (many British soldiers had, out of need, taken part-time jobs away from Bostonians). Another problem was the Quartering Act, by which Bostonians were forced to house and feed British troops. These factors led to a bloody confrontation on March 5, 1770, known as the Boston Massacre. The prolonged British effort to bring the colonies to heel and colonial resistance to it ended with the so-called Boston Tea Party. In May 1773, Parliament attempted to rescue the financially strapped yet politically well-connected British East India Company. The government authorized the company to sell its considerable surplus of tea directly to its own agents in America. The tea would actually be cheaper, even with the tax in place, than smuggled Dutch tea, but the arrangement would cut out colonial middlemen, establishing a monopoly on the principal colonial drink and ending a major element of the smuggling trade. Public meetings in New York, Philadelphia, and Boston all condemned the act. On the evening of December 16, some 8,000 people in Boston met in protest of the arrival there of three ships carrying East India Company tea. Afterward, a number of the men, in the guise of Mohawk Indians, boarded the ships and, working throughout the night, emptied them of 342 large chests of tea, which were dumped into Boston

Harbor. Further disorders against the landing of tea followed. This event ended the period of British government patience. Frustrated by its fruitless decade-long effort to tax the colonies and by colonial intransigence and lawlessness, London now adopted a harder line. Determined to teach the rebellious American subjects a lesson, in March 1774, King George III, who was determined to exercise his royal prerogatives, and his ministers pushed through Parliament the first of what became known as the Coercive Acts, mea­ sures known in America as the Intolerable Acts. The first of these, the Boston Port Bill, closed the port of Boston, threatening the colony with economic ruin. Other legislation suspended the Charter of Massachusetts, placed that colony under martial law, and gave the new government extensive new powers over town meetings. The Quartering Act required colonial authorities to provide housing and supplies for British troops. If the colonists made restitution for the destroyed tea, the restrictions would be lifted. Nonetheless, this strong action against a colonial government and the colony’s economic livelihood created a firestorm in America, lending credence to arguments by New England’s radical leaders that the British were out to crush American liberties. At the same time, although not part of the coercive program, the Quebec Act of May 1774 seemed to be a gratuitous British insult and one of the “intolerable” measures. Actually one of the most enlightened pieces of imperial legislation of its day, the act sought to reconcile the large number of French Catholics to British rule by granting full civil rights and religious freedom to Canadians. This was anathema to many Protestants in New England. More important for the seaboard colonies, the act



defined the borders of the former New France as the French had drawn them, cutting them off from further westward expansion. After the Intolerable Acts and the Quebec Act, self-authorized groups met in several colonies and sent delegates to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia in September 1774. The delegation adopted the so-called Continental Association that called for nonimportation of English goods after December 1. North American lieutenant general Thomas Gage reported to London that the situation was dangerous and that he lacked sufficient manpower to deal with events if fighting were to break out. This did not affect George III and his ministers, who were determined to pursue a hard line. In February 1775, Parliament declared Massachusetts to be in rebellion. Gage strongly disagreed with London’s approach. In a report sent to London but not shared with Parliament, he estimated that in the event of fighting, it would take a year or two and 20,000 men just to pacify

Causes of the American Revolution | xvii

New England. If these men could not be supplied, Gage advocated a naval blockade and economic pressure as the best approach. The ministry in London disagreed. It held that 10,000 troops, supported by Loyalists, would be sufficient. Surely Gage was a defeatist or worse. London was convinced that the vast majority of Americans were loyal to the Crown, that any problems were the work of only a few agitators, and that a show of force and the arrest of the troublemakers would restore order; all would then be well. The war that London now entered into so blithely caught Britain unprepared. Troops would have to be raised, the navy would have to be rebuilt, and men and supplies would have to be shipped across the Atlantic Ocean. While the Royal Navy, once rebuilt, could enforce a blockade and land troops at any point on the American seaboard and extract them again, campaigning in the interior in a land without adequate roads or strategic centers would be difficult indeed. Spencer C. Tucker

Course of the American Revolution

Fighting began on April 19, 1775, when Gage sent troops from Boston to destroy stores of arms that the radicals had been stockpiling at Concord. Similar operations in the past had been successful, but this time the militia was alerted. At Lexington, the soldiers encountered a hastily assembled small militia force but, in a brief skirmish, brushed them aside. The British then marched on to Concord and completed their mission. The withdrawal to Boston became a nightmare, however, for the local militiamen were then out in force and sniped at the British from along the route. The operation claimed 273 British casualties of some 1,800 engaged and 95 Americans. Some 15,000 New England militiamen then closed around Boston. Commanded by Major General Artemus Ward, they commenced the Siege of Boston (April 19, 1775–March 17, 1776). In 1775, perhaps a quarter of Americans counted themselves Patriots, another quarter remained loyal to Britain, and half of Americans were neutral. The Patriots were highly motivated, however, and they secured control of most of the local militia formations, using these throughout the war to control local Loyalists (Tories) and the countryside as well as to assist Continental Army formations in combat. In the latter role, however, the poorly trained militiamen often broke and ran.

On May 10, 1775, 83 Patriots led by Connecticut colonel Ethan Allen and Massachusetts colonel Benedict Arnold surprised and seized poorly garrisoned British Forts Ticonderoga and Crown Point on Lake Champlain, securing there 78 serviceable cannon and military supplies. In late May, British major generals John Burgoyne, Henry Clinton, and William Howe arrived at Boston with 3,500 troops, bringing British strength there to 6,500 men. They carried orders to impose martial law throughout Massachusetts, and they pressed Gage to undertake offensive action. At the same time, the British government was scouring the German states to hire troops to augment its own small professional army. These auxiliaries, numbering in all some 30,000 men, came to be known collectively as Hessians, as perhaps half of them were from Hesse-Kassel (Hesse-Cassel). The Second Continental Congress, having in mid-May urged all 13 colonial governments to undertake military preparedness, nonetheless recognized the need for a regular military establishment, and in June it authorized the establishment of 10 rifle companies for the Continental Army (Army of the United Colonies) and named Virginian George Washington as general and its commander. Washington took up his duties at Cambridge, Massachusetts, in early July. xix

xx | Course of the American Revolution

On October 30, Congress also voted to establish a navy. A number of its ships were conversions, and some were secured abroad, although Congress approved construction of 13 frigates. A number of states also raised navies, and Washington authorized armed schooners to disrupt British supplies into Boston. However, the main Patriot effort at sea during the war was by privateers. These captured some 3,087 British ships. Although a number were retaken, 2,208 were left in American hands. The Americans also captured 89 British privateers, of which 75 remained in American hands. (British privateers captured 1,135 American merchantmen, of which 27 were retaken or ransomed. The British also captured 216 privateers.) These figures compare with a total of 196 ships captured by the Continental Navy. The captures of merchantmen drove up insurance rates and helped turn many in the British merchant class against the war. American privateers and Continental Navy ships may also have taken prisoner as many as 16,000 British seamen. This compares to 22,000 British soldiers taken by the Continental Army during the war. On June 17, 1775, during the Siege of Boston, General Howe led an amphibious operation in Boston Harbor to seize high ground fortified by the Patriots on the Charlestown Peninsula. Instead of simply cutting off the rebel force by taking Charlestown Neck, Howe opted for a frontal assault. The ensuing Battle of Bunker Hill was a British victory but at terrible cost. Of 2,400 British troops engaged, 1,054—including 92 officers—were casualties, with 226 dead. Probably some 1,500 Americans were engaged; of these, 140 were killed, 380 were wounded, and 39 were captured. The battle shook Howe and may well have contributed to his later failure to press home attacks.

Fighting worked against reconciliation. At the end of July, the Continental Congress rejected a plan put forward by British prime minister Lord Frederick North, 2nd Earl of Guilford, for reconciliation. It called for an end to taxes that raised money to pay for British officials and military personnel. The Continental Congress, however, continued to insist that colonial legislatures alone should determine how monies raised might be spent. King George III’s Royal Proclamation of Rebellion was issued in late August, pledging severe punishment for all officials deemed treasonous, in effect ending the possibility of reconciliation. On June 1, the Continental Congress had voted to dispatch expeditionary forces to Canada to seal the back door to America. There would be two separate forces: the first would take Montreal and then join the second in capturing Quebec. The first force, initially under Major Philip Schuyler, stalled in a poorly conducted Patriot siege of St. Johns on the Richelieu River. Colonel Benedict Arnold meanwhile led a second force through the Maine wilderness to Quebec. With St. Johns finally taken and Montreal seized, Brigadier General Richard Montgomery joined Arnold at Quebec. With enlistments expiring and supplies running out, the Americans attempted a desperate attack on December 31, 1775. Mounted in a snowstorm, it was a complete failure. Montgomery was killed, and Arnold was wounded. The British captured 426 Americans; another 50 were killed or wounded but not captured. British losses were only 5 killed and 13 wounded. Arnold attempted to maintain a siege with his remaining men, but the arrival in May 1776 of a British supply ship ended it. In the spring of 1776, British reinforcements drove the Americans, belatedly reinforced, from Canada. The Canadian expedition would



have succeeded had it been adequately supported from the start. During the winter of 1775–1776, the Americans transported cannon from Fort Ticonderoga to Boston. In March 1776, they seized undefended Dorchester Heights, fortified it, and then placed the cannon there. This led Howe, who had replaced Gage as British commander, to withdraw from Boston, sailing to Halifax, Nova Scotia. Washington permitted the British to depart unmolested on Howe’s pledge not to destroy the city. To counter the likely possibility of a British invasion of New York down Lake Champlain that would cut off New England from the rest of the colonies, Arnold, now a brigadier general, oversaw construction of a small flotilla of gondolas and galleys. In the Battle of Valcour Island, October 11–13, 1776, the more powerful British flotilla destroyed the American vessels, but the delay that Arnold had imposed caused Major General Sir Guy Carleton, the British commander in Canada, to call off the planned invasion that year. Meanwhile, Patriot forces repulsed a British attempt under Major General Henry Clinton to take Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina. In the Battle of Sullivan’s Island (June 28, 1776), the British lost several warships in the effort. On July 4, the Continental Congress voted to approve the Declaration of Independence. That same month, Howe arrived by sea at New York with 33,000 British and German troops. Washington had anticipated this move but had rejected mounted formations, and his defensive dispositions were poor. However, Howe showed little imagination and lacked drive. The British defeated the Americans in the Battle of Long Island (August 27, 1776) and then crossed to Manhattan and pushed Washington’s forces

Course of the American Revolution | xxi

northward, taking New York City and then defeating the Americans at Harlem Heights (September 16) and White Plains (October 28). Washington extracted his forces except for a large garrison, subsequently reinforced, under Colonel Robert Magaw at Fort Washington, on the east bank of the Hudson. Washington believed that, if necessary, it could be evacuated across the river. He also reinforced it to nearly 3,000 men. Howe, however, sent ships up the river and 10,000 men against the fort from the land side on November 16, taking it by assault the same day. The British losses were 78 killed and 374 wounded; 59 Americans died, and 96 were wounded. But American losses in prisoners and supplies were staggering. The British captured 230 officers and 2,607 soldiers. They also secured 146 cannon, 2,800 muskets, 12,000 shot and shell, and 400,000 musket cartridges. It was second only to the surrender of Charles Town in 1780 as the worst Patriot defeat of the entire war. The same thing almost happened to Fort Lee, across the Hudson from Fort Washington, but its garrison was forewarned and the men got away, although they were forced to abandon military stores. Washington now withdrew across New Jersey, leisurely pursued by Howe. In December, the British occupied the port of Rhode Island, securing there a major anchorage for their navy. After setting up a string of outposts in western New Jersey, Howe went into winter quarters. It looked as if the war was about over. With most Continental Army enlistments set to expire at the end of the year, Washington decided on a daring gamble. He would cross the Delaware River early on December 26 with some 5,500 men in three bodies and attack Colonel Johann Rall’s

xxii | Course of the American Revolution

1,600 Hessians at Trenton. Only Washington’s group of 2,400 made it across in time for the attack. But Washington pressed ahead, and the surprise was complete. Artillery, in which the Americans had a considerable advantage, was a major factor. The Hessians had 22 killed, 92 wounded (Rall mortally), and 948 captured. The remaining Hessians would also have been taken had the other American columns gotten into position in time. Americans casualties were 2 men frozen to death and 5 wounded. The Continental Army then withdrew back across the Delaware. Trenton changed the war. It helped end the fear of Hessian troops and added immensely to Washington’s prestige, which had been at such a low point a month before. The battle also restored Patriot morale. Washington had seemingly “snatched victory out of the jaws of death.” Washington recrossed the Delaware for an attack on Princeton on January 3, 1777, and was again victorious. He then went into winter quarters at Morristown, New Jersey. During the early months of 1777, Patriot forces harried British communications in New Jersey with guerrilla attacks. France, meanwhile, was providing military assistance to the Patriots. Pushed by his foreign minister, Charles Gravier, comte de Vergennes, who was anxious to weaken France’s rival Britain but also to avenge France’s humiliating defeats of the French and Indian War and concurrent Seven Years’ War, King Louis XVI agreed in 1776 to extend secret aid to the American rebels. This assistance ultimately included more than 200 cannon, 20–30 mortars, 30,000 small arms, 100 tons of gunpowder, and clothing and tents sufficient for 25,000 men. Its importance cannot be overstated. Meanwhile, British secretary of state for the American Department, Lord George

Germain, the man actually running the war for the British, approved two different, even opposing, plans for the 1777 campaign. The first would see Howe move against Philadelphia. Howe believed that Washington would be forced to defend the Patriot capital, giving Howe the chance to destroy him. The second plan would see Lieutenant General John Burgoyne push south from Canada along the Lake Champlain corridor to Albany, New York, where he expected to meet part of Howe’s army driving north up the Hudson from New York City. Burgoyne also planned a secondary campaign in conjunction with allied Native Americans in the Mohawk Valley to force a dispersion of Patriot resources. British control of the Hudson would cut off New England from the rest of the colonies, but Burgoyne’s polycentric plan failed to take into account difficult logistical considerations, problems of coordination and timing, and Howe’s own plan, which meant that few troops would be available to move up the Hudson from New York City. Leaving General Clinton in command at New York, Howe set sail with some 16,000 troops on July 26. The men began coming ashore at the head of the Chesapeake Bay on August 25 and then moved toward Philadelphia. On September 11, Howe defeated Washington’s army of 11,000 men along Brandywine Creek. Howe fixed the Americans in place with part of his army while marching with the majority around the American right to get in behind Washington and bag his entire force. Howe was again slow, and Washington was able to withdraw in good order. American casualties were some 200 killed, 700–800 wounded, and almost 400 prisoners. The British losses were 99 killed, 488 wounded, and 6 missing. Howe occupied Philadelphia on September 26.



On October 4, Washington with 11,000 men attempted a complicated night march against the British encampment at Germantown near Philadelphia. It met failure, thanks to poor coordination of the attacking columns and the timely arrival of British reinforcements from Philadelphia. American losses were 152 killed, 521 wounded, and about 400 taken prisoner. The British losses were 71 killed, 450 wounded, and 14 missing. In a series of hard-fought actions and heavy casualties on both sides, Howe took Patriot forts on the Delaware River and thereby opened a supply line for the Royal Navy to Philadelphia. He then settled in at Philadelphia for the winter. Washington also went into winter quarters at nearby Valley Forge, during which German volunteer Wilhelm von Steuben became drillmaster of the army, instilling in it both order and discipline. This enabled the Continentals to fight on equal footing with their British counterparts. Although Howe had informed Burgoyne of his plans and there was little chance of major assistance, Burgoyne pressed ahead with his own campaign, starting out in June 1777 with some 10,500 men. At first, all went well. In early July, Burgoyne easily recaptured Fort Ticonderoga, but the advance then slowed, owing to both the terrain and the highly effective scorched-earth policy practiced by American commander Major General Schuyler. At the same time, Burgoyne’s secondary effort met rebuff in the Siege of Fort Stanwix (August 2–23, 1777). With his supply situation becoming desperate, Burgoyne dispatched a foraging expedition of Hessians into Vermont. On August 16, Brigadier General John Stark and some 2,200 militiamen defeated these and a reinforcing unit in the Battle of

Course of the American Revolution | xxiii

Bennington. In all, the Hessians sustained 207 killed and 700 captured for American casualties of only 30 killed and 40 wounded. The Patriot side also secured much-needed military supplies and weapons. Refusing suggestions that he withdraw, Burgoyne crossed the Hudson River and advanced to Bemis Heights, where he came upon defensive works ordered by the new American commander, Major General Horatio Gates. On September 19, in the Battle of Freeman’s Farm (First Battle of Saratoga), some 8,000 defenders rebuffed a British attack. Burgoyne attacked again on October 7, and in the Battle of Bemis Heights (Second Battle of Saratoga), he was again halted. Too late, Burgoyne tried to withdraw but was forced to surrender his army of 5,895 officers and men on October 17. The surrender of an entire British army was decisive, for it convinced French leaders that the Patriot side could indeed win the war. On February 6, 1778, the French government signed a treaty of alliance with the United States. Britain declared war on France in June. Spain followed France into the war the next year, hoping to secure Gibraltar, and the Dutch Republic joined when Britain declared war on it in late 1780. The American War of Independence had become a world war. Recognizing the changed situation, London now offered the United States everything it wanted, except independence. This came too late and was spurned. Howe resigned his command in the spring of 1778 and was replaced by Clinton. Now a lieutenant general, Clinton withdrew British forces from Philadelphia across New Jersey to be conveyed by ship to New York. Determined to attack Clinton en route, on June 28, Washington fell on Clinton’s rear elements in the Battle of Monmouth, the

xxiv | Course of the American Revolution

last major engagement of the war in the North. Major General Charles Lee badly managed the Continental attack, and Washington ended up taking command and defending against a British counterattack. American losses were 152 killed and 300 wounded versus British losses of 290 killed, 390 wounded, and 576 captured. Clinton was able to return to New York City, however. Washington took up station at White Plains. Washington could do little to halt subsequent British raids on Connecticut and New Jersey coastal towns, and he was keenly disappointed that a newly arrived French fleet under Vice Admiral Jean-BaptisteCharles-Henri-Hector, comte d’Estaing, with 4,000 ground troops, was unable to attack British ships in New York Harbor, largely thanks to Vice Admiral Lord Richard Howe’s skillful ship dispositions. Washington then agreed to a plan for a joint attack by d’Estaing and Patriot ground forces against the British garrison of some 3,000 men at Rhode Island, commanded by Major General Robert Pigot. Major General John Sullivan had command of the Patriot ground element, numbering with militia some 10,000 men. D’Estaing was to provide naval support and land French troops. D’Estaing secured control of Narragansett Bay, costing the British 5 frigates, 2 sloops, and several galleys, although their guns and ammunition were offloaded and added to the British land defenses. Howe sailed from New York with 13 ships of the line to engage d’Estaing with 12, but the anticipated major naval confrontation did not occur because of a hurricane on August 11 that damaged both fleets. Despite Sullivan’s pleas to remain for even a few days longer, d’Estaing insisted on removing his ships to Boston to effect repairs. Sullivan then continued on alone. Sullivan might still have won a

victory, but with d’Estaing’s departure, most of the American militiamen lost heart and decamped. Pigot then sortied from Newport and, with 3,000 troops, attacked the Americans with 5,000. In this Battle of Newport (August 28–29), the Americans blunted the British attack. Sullivan then withdrew northward, removing his men from the island on the night of August 30. It was a wise decision; for the next day, 4,000 British reinforcements arrived. Thereafter, the war in the northern states was largely a stalemate. The British raided New England coastal towns, and the Americans attacked isolated British garrisons. In one such effort, Brigadier General Anthony Wayne attacked the strong British outpost at Stony Point, New York, capturing it with the bayonet alone on July 15, 1779. The Americans losses were 15 killed and 80 wounded, but British losses were 63 killed, more than 70 wounded, and 543 captured. Although Wayne was forced to abandon the post several days later, the attack had secured much-needed arms, including 15 cannon, as well as supplies. In October 1779, the British evacuated Rhode Island. In 1780, Major General Benedict Arnold, who had sought command of West Point, turned traitor and endeavored to surrender to the British that key fortification on the Hudson along with Continental Army commander General Washington. The plot was discovered in late September, but Arnold was able to flee to the British. He accepted a British commission as a brigadier general and subsequently campaigned in Virginia. In July 1781, French Army lieutenant general Comte de Rochambeau arrived at Newport with 5,000 French troops to cooperate with Washington. As the war continued, the American economy sharply deteriorated. With wealth



mostly in land and Congress unable to tax, the central government resorted to printing paper money to pay its bills, and this led to rampant inflation and currency that was all but worthless. Among the consequences were several mutinies in the Continental line. Fighting now largely shifted to the American South. Germain and other British leaders in London concluded that the South, with a perceived larger Loyalist population, might be more easily conquered, with the plan to secure an area and then raise Loyalist militias to control it. In December 1778, Clinton sent a military force to take the important seaport of Savannah, Georgia. It fell to the British on December 29. American losses were some 550, including 450 captured. The British suffered only 9 men killed and 4 wounded. The British also secured weapons and ships in the harbor. In early September 1779, d’Estaing arrived off the mouth of the Savannah River with 20 ships of the line, 13 smaller warships, and 3,900 ground troops. However, he was slow to move against the British. Finally disembarking his ground troops, on September 12, he invested Savannah, being joined during the next week by the Continental Army commander in the South, Major General Benjamin Lincoln, with more than 2,000 Continentals and militia from Charles Town. The British commander at Savannah, Major General Augustine Prevost, had 3,500 men, but he quickly improved the already strong city defenses. Unwilling to wait too long lest his fleet encounter the hurricane season, d’Estaing insisted on an assault, but a deserter alerted the British as to the exact point of the attack and repelled the allied assaults of October 9. These cost the allies 244 killed, 584 wounded, and 120 captured. British losses were only 40 killed, 63 wounded, and 52

Course of the American Revolution | xxv

missing or deserted. Refusing to remain longer, d’Estaing embarked his men and sailed away, and Lincoln returned to Charles Town. Clinton now prepared a major seaborne assault from New York City on Charles Town by 8,000 British regulars and Loyalist militia. Charles Town’s leaders insisted that Lincoln fight for the city, and he allowed his forces to be bottled up there. When the British began shelling the city during the resultant siege of March 29–May 12, 1780, the same city leaders insisted that Lincoln surrender. It was the greatest Continental Army defeat of the war. The siege itself claimed 89 Americans killed and 138 wounded, while the British lost 76 killed and 189 wounded. In the surrender, however, the British captured 5,466 officers and men (including 7 generals), 400 cannon, and 6,000 muskets. They also secured several Continental Navy frigates. British forces soon moved into interior South Carolina, cooperating with Loyalist militias to set up military outposts. Clinton left Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis as British commander in the South and returned to New York. Named to replace Lincoln, Major General Gates collected all the forces he could and rashly marched southward from Hillsborough, North Carolina. Cornwallis rushed northward, and the two forces came together at Camden, South Carolina, on August 16. The Continentals fought well; however, the militiamen broke and ran, and Gates was routed. The British suffered 68 killed, 245 wounded, and 11 missing. American losses were some 900 killed or wounded and 1,000 captured. The British also secured artillery, small arms, and all the American stores and baggage. Gates escaped capture, but Washington replaced him with Major General Nathanael Greene.

xxvi | Course of the American Revolution

After Camden, Cornwallis moved northward toward Charlotte, North Carolina, where he hoped to find strong Loyalist support. A virtual civil war now raged in the South between Patriots and Loyalists in which both sides committed atrocities. One large encounter between the two militias, the Battle of King’s Mountain, on October 7, brought a resounding Patriot victory. British major Patrick Ferguson’s Loyalist force of 1,125 men suffered 1,105 dead or captured (refusing surrender, Ferguson was among the slain). Patriot losses were only 40 killed. This defeat of his western flanking force caused Cornwallis to suspend his effort to secure all of North Carolina, and he fell back to Winnsboro, South Carolina, for the winter. The British suffered another defeat on January 17, 1781, when, without reconnoitering, Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton’s legion charged a Continental Army and militia force under Brigadier General Daniel Morgan at Cowpens, South Carolina. Although Tarleton escaped, he lost 90 percent of his force: 100 dead, 229 wounded, and 600 unwounded prisoners. Morgan’s losses were only 12 killed and 60 wounded. Morgan also secured some 800 muskets, 2 cannon, 100 horses, and all the British supplies and ammunition. Patriot morale soared. Determined to bag Morgan, Cornwallis moved against him in force. Greene and his forces now joined Morgan, and a race northward ensued. Greene won the so-called Race to the Dan (the river separating North Carolina and Virginia) during January 19– February 15, 1781, in what is regarded as one of the most masterly withdrawals in U.S. military history. Greene reorganized his forces and again advanced into North Carolina in early 1781. On March 15, the two sides again came together in the Battle of Guilford

Courthouse. Greene had 4,404 men; however, only 1,490 were Continental troops, and only about 500 of these were trained veterans. The remainder were unreliable militia. Cornwallis had only 1,900 men; however, all were regulars, and almost all of these were veterans. The battle was hardfought, but Greene was unwilling to hazard his forces and withdrew. Cornwallis trumpeted a victory, but it was costly. The Americans sustained 264 casualties: 79 killed and 185 wounded. Another 160 Continentals were missing, along with several hundred militia, most of them having simply decamped. British casualties were, however, a quarter of their force: 93 killed and 439 wounded, a number of these mortally. After retiring to Wilmington to regroup, Cornwallis decided to move with the bulk of his army into Virginia to cut the flow of supplies southward to Greene. Lieutenant Colonel Francis, Lord Rawdon, assumed command of British forces in South Carolina. Greene, choosing not to follow Cornwallis, began driving British forces from inland North and South Carolina. Although Greene sustained defeats in the battles at Hobkirk’s Hill (April 25) and Eutaw Springs (September 8, 1781), his masterful Southern campaign secured virtually all of North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia, forcing the British into coastal enclaves at Charles Town and Savannah. Meanwhile, following raids in the Virginia interior, Cornwallis withdrew his forces to the tobacco port of Yorktown shadowed by a smaller American force under Major General Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette. Washington had hoped that he and Rochambeau might attack New York City, but then learned that French vice admiral François-Joseph-Paul, comte de Grasse-Tilly, planned to avoid hurricane



season in the West Indies by sailing northward with a powerful fleet and 3,300 ground troops for Chesapeake Bay and remain there until October. Seeing the possibility of entrapping Cornwallis, Washington and Rochambeau marched with 7,000 men southward toward Yorktown. Meanwhile, on August 30, de Grasse arrived in the Chesapeake with 28 ships of the line and commenced landing his ground forces. At the same time, Rear Admiral Thomas Graves with 5 ships of the line, reinforced by 14 ships of the line under Rear Admiral Samuel Hood, just arrived from the West Indies, sailed from New York in August in an effort to intercept 8 ships of the line and 18 transports under French commodore Jacques-Melchior Saint-Laurent, comte de Barras, sailing from Newport and correctly presumed to be heading for Chesapeake Bay. Sailing faster than Barras, Graves arrived in Chesapeake Bay first on September 5 and there discovered de Grasse. Instead of swooping down on the more powerful but unprepared French fleet, Graves formed his ships into line ahead and waited for de Grasse to come out. Shorthanded, with many of his men occupied in ferrying French and American troops down the bay, de Grasse nonetheless stood out with 24 ships of the line to meet the British. The resulting engagement was a draw. With no ships lost on either side, the British sustained 336 casualties and the French 221. Several days of inconclusive maneuvering followed, during which Barras arrived. Graves then decided to return to New York to gather additional ships. Thus, this tactically inconclusive Second Battle of the Chesapeake doomed Cornwallis at Yorktown and deserves to be ranked among the most important strategic victories in world history.

Course of the American Revolution | xxvii

On September 28, the allies laid siege to Yorktown. Following some fighting and having run out of food, Cornwallis surrendered on October 19, 1781. A total of 8,077 British surrendered: 840 seamen, 80 camp followers, and 7,157 soldiers. During the siege, the British losses were 156 killed and 326 wounded. The allies suffered only 75 killed and 199 wounded. When Parliament learned of this dire event, it voted on March 4, 1782, to end offensive war in America, and peace negotiations commenced in earnest between American and French envoys in Paris. Fighting continued in America, including operations in the Ohio Country that helped secure that vast territory for the United States in the peace settlement, but most of the warfare was of low intensity. Overseas, there was fighting in India. The British withstood a long siege by the Spaniards and French at Gibraltar (1779–1783), and the French, Spaniards, Dutch, and British all sought to capture islands in the West Indies that belonged to the other side. Any French advantage here, however, was lost late in the war with the British naval victory of the Battle of the Saintes (April 12, 1782). On March 20, 1782, rather than lose a vote of no confidence, Lord North resigned as prime minister. On November 30, 1782, representatives of the United States and the British government signed the Treaty of Paris. This was in violation of the Franco-American alliance, which stipulated that neither was to sign a separate peace with the British. It also ignored protests by Spain concerning lands east of the Mississippi River. However, the treaty was not to take effect until the fighting between Britain and France and Spain was also resolved. Spencer C. Tucker

Consequences of the American Revolution

The British evacuated Charles Town on December 14, 1782, and the French departed America six days later. The British retained control of New York City as a bargaining chip until peace was finally agreed upon between Britain, France, and Spain on January 20, 1783. On February 4, 1783, King George III declared a formal end to hostilities with the United States. On November 25, the last British troops left New York, and on January 14, 1784, the Confederation Congress ratified the Treaty of Paris, officially ending the American Revolutionary War. The most important article of the Peace Treaty of Paris in 1783 was the one granting independence to the United States. The Americans also secured territory as far west as the Mississippi River, free navigation of the Mississippi, fishing rights off the Grand Banks, and the removal of British troops from American soil. British leaders were prompted to grant such generous terms in an effort to wean the United States from France. In that, they were successful. Perhaps surprisingly, Britain suffered little from the loss of its major colonies. Trade promptly resumed and at greater volume than before. France, for all its considerable efforts and expense, gained virtually nothing except a crushing increase in its national debt.

Although France was the richest nation in Europe, the government was chronically poor, as the church (the First Estate with some 1 percent of the population) and nobles (the Second Estate with 2 percent of the population) controlled half of the land of France. By 1788, 51 percent of the Crown’s income was going merely to pay the interest on the national debt. The financial crisis caused by the military effort against Britain forced the Crown to move to tax the nobles and the church. They resisted and, in the socalled Aristocratic Reaction, demanded the calling of the States General, which had last met in 1614. The leaders of the Third Estate (with 97 percent of the nation’s population), buoyed by the ideas of popular sovereignty and democracy embodied in the American Revolution as well as the nobles’ example, now stood firm in the Estate General, bringing about the French Revolution of 1789– 1799. This ultimately had immense impact not only in France but in Europe and much of the rest of the world. Estimates vary, but at least 80,000 Loyalists left the territory of the United States during 1775–1783, many of them taking slaves with them. Some Loyalists remained in the United States, and a number of these received fair treatment, retaining possession of their property. Many others, however, found themselves stripped of their

xxix

xxx | Consequences of the American Revolution

property and were forced to live as secondclass citizens. The vast majority of those who departed settled either in Britain or in the maritime provinces of Canada. Certainly, they helped change Canada from a French-speaking majority with strong ties to France to a bilingual nation with close ties to Britain, and they proved to be of great advantage to Britain during the War of 1812. Some 50,000 Black slaves had sought refuge with the British from their masters during the war. Indeed, some fought on the British side during the conflict. Although the British had promised freedom to any slaves who could escape to their lines during the war, only about a tenth of their number were actually granted this. The majority were either sold back into slavery or died from various diseases. More than 3,000 former slaves settled in Nova Scotia under harsh conditions, and about 1,200 left to found Freetown in Sierra Leone. Despite the exalted phrases of the Declaration of Independence, slavery continued in the United States after the war, supported by a majority of the population, who at the same time largely condemned the slave trade. By 1787, all the states except Georgia and South Carolina had passed legislation condemning the latter. Such legislation was poorly enforced, however, and it certainly did not change the horrific conditions faced by many of the half million slaves then living in the United States. By 1804, all the northern states except Delaware and Maryland had passed legislation abolishing slavery within their borders. It was not until the 1861–1865 Civil War, fought largely over this issue, that slavery finally ended throughout the United States. The Thirteenth Amendment of 1865 to the U.S. Constitution abolished slavery; yet, even then, there was hardly racial equality.

The Revolutionary War also had great impact on western expansion. During the conflict, hundreds of settlers had moved westward across the Allegheny Mountains. With restrictions imposed by the Quebec Act of 1774 now removed, this became a flood. Kentucky became a state in 1792, and Tennessee followed in 1796. Before too many years, settlers spanned the entire continent. The movement west, however, brought direct clashes with the first Americans, the Indians, or Native Americans. For Native Americans, the Revolutionary War proved disastrous. Without a European power to act as a counter to the triumphant Americans, the Indian nations had little leverage against continued white encroachment of their ancestral lands. A vicious war between the Indians and the American military occurred in the Old Northwest Territory between 1785 and 1795, ending in a Native American defeat in the Battle of Fallen Timbers. Indeed, the relentless westward expansionism by settlers brought a string of wars between Native Americans and the U.S. government that did not end until 1890, at which time most remaining Native Americans had been herded onto reservations. Meanwhile, the United States appeared to be anything but united. The Articles of Confederation that served as the first constitution during 1781–1789 proved to be highly ineffective. Faced with the experience of what they regarded as overbearing British power, American Patriot leaders had established a system that was a confederation of essentially sovereign states. In 1786, the new nation was confronted with Shays’ Rebellion. This unrest in Massachusetts was prompted by dismal economic conditions, especially in western New England, where many former Continental Army soldiers found themselves



Consequences of the American Revolution | xxxi

deeply in debt and in danger of losing their lands. Daniel Shays, a former Continental Army captain, became the reluctant leader. In January 1787, the rebels attempted to prevent the Massachusetts Supreme Court from sitting at Springfield and also to secure weapons from the federal arsenal there. The rebels, who had not expected confrontation, were dispersed by artillery fire, and the rebellion fizzled and was over by the next February. Fortunately, Massachusetts state leaders had the good sense to recognize the legitimate nature of the grievances and acted with moderation. Only two men were executed in the affair, and these for legitimate charges. Shays’ Rebellion greatly strengthened the hands of those who sought to replace the weak Articles of Confederation with a stronger form of government. By the late 1780s, the young United States faced a host of problems. In addition to the concerns raised by Shays’ Rebellion, many American leaders understood that the current political arrangement under the Articles of Confederation was clearly not up to the task of governing the country. These did not permit a chief executive, a bicameral legislature, or a system of checks and balances. Also, the national government was not empowered to levy taxes, leaving that to

the individual states. In short, the national government had no effective way to raise revenue or manage the country’s large warrelated debts. Worse yet, it had no authority to compel the individual states to remit tax receipts. Finally, decision-making under the Articles of Confederation essentially meant leadership by committee, which had proven to be largely unworkable. In 1787, a Constitutional Convention convened in Philadelphia, and in 1789, the new document received the required state ratifications and was declared in force. The U.S. Constitution gave more powers to the central government, including the right to levy taxes. Today, the world’s oldest written instrument of government is still in force. The U.S. Constitution set up a system of checks and balances. The president is the head of the executive branch and commander in chief of the armed forces. The legislative branch of Congress has the right to vote taxes, declare war, and raise armies. There is also a judicial branch, in the form of the U.S. Supreme Court. The United States soon became a beacon of hope for the oppressed of much of the rest of the world, the citizens of which wished that their own nations might be more like it. Spencer C. Tucker

A Adams, John(1735–1826)

upholder of the law and not a revolutionist, Adams opposed the Stamp Act of 1765, which required Americans to place stamps on all legal documents and newspapers, because the colonists had never given their consent to such taxation. The resolutions of protest against British rule that he prepared for Braintree were adopted throughout Massachusetts. In 1770, although he knew it was an unpopular cause, Adams was one of the lawyers who agreed to defend the British soldiers involved in the Boston Massacre, which in part had been instigated by his cousin, Samuel Adams. The soldiers, who had fired into a mob and killed five men, were acquitted of murder. His prestige untarnished, John Adams was then elected to the Massachusetts General Court as a representative from Boston. In 1774, Adams was chosen as one of the delegates from Massachusetts to the First Continental Congress. At the Second Continental Congress, in 1775, he pressed for a complete break with Great Britain and was responsible for George Washington’s appointment as commander in chief of the Continental Army. The following year, it was Adams who seconded the motion of Richard Henry Lee for a declaration of independence, and he was appointed to the committee to draft the document. While in the Continental Congress during 1775–1777, Adams served on many important committees, including the one responsible for drafting the Declaration of Independence (on which Thomas Jefferson took the lead). Adams was also an

Lawyer, ardent Patriot, diplomat, congressman, vice president of the United States (1789–1797), and president of the United States (1797–1801), John Adams was born on October 30, 1735, in Braintree, Massachusetts. He graduated from Harvard College in 1755, was admitted to the bar in 1758, and quickly established a successful Boston practice. Although by nature an

A lawyer by profession, John Adams of Massachusetts was a prominent leader of the revolution. He served ably in the Continental Congress, and after the war, he was ambassador to France, then vice president (1789– 1797), and president of the United States (1797–1801). (National Gallery of Art) 1

| Adams, John 2 accomplished political theorist and pamphleteer, having authored a number of proPatriot works prior to and during the early stages of the American Revolutionary War. Perhaps his most well-read and influential political pamphlet was Thoughts on Government, published in April 1776. In a mere 10 pages of text, Adams expounded on subjects ranging from the ideal setup for republican governments to the qualifications required to vote or hold elective office. This work was used as a blueprint for several state constitutions, including that of Massachusetts, and would later influence the drafters of the U.S. Constitution of 1787. In 1778, Adams was sent to Europe to obtain a treaty of alliance with France, only to find when he arrived that this had already been accomplished by Benjamin Franklin. Jealous of Franklin’s popularity and unhappy with his own position, Adams returned home and began work on the Massachusetts Constitution, becoming its principal author. In 1781, Congress asked him to go back to Europe to help negotiate peace with the British and various commercial treaties. As minister to the Netherlands, Adams secured that country’s recognition of the United States as well as some badly needed loans for the new nation. Later, he returned to France, and in concert with Franklin and John Jay, he negotiated the Treaty of Paris (1783) with Great Britain to end the revolution. Adams remained in Europe as the American minister to Great Britain until 1788. After his return, he was elected the first vice president of the United States, a post to which he was reelected in 1792 despite the opposition of Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton and Adams strongly disliked each other. Hamilton thought that Adams did not believe strongly enough in the need for a powerful central government and in the

protection of the rights of the newly emerging wealthy business class, and Adams was sure that Hamilton wanted to establish aristocratic rule in the United States. In 1796, Adams overcame Hamilton’s opposition to his candidacy to win a narrow victory for the presidency. The Adams administration was dominated by the development of the two-party system and the repercussions of the French Revolution, which began in 1789. Adams assumed the office of the presidency during the emergence of two national political parties: the Federalists, nominally led by Hamilton, and the Democratic-Republicans, led by Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson and his supporters believed that Adams, who actually considered himself above party affiliation, was a Federalist and a man who wanted to be king and subject the populace to his tyranny. To the Democratic-Republicans, Adams did not believe strongly enough in the need to keep the central government weak to forestall threats to individual liberty, and a deep antagonism developed between Adams and Jefferson, his vice president, even though the two men had been close friends and political colleagues. Adams followed Washington’s advice of maintaining strict American neutrality in the wars between Britain and France. His efforts were complicated by the fact that Hamilton and other Federalists were sympathetic to Britain, while Jefferson and his Democratic-Republicans were sympathetic to France and the French Revolution. France, angry over the U.S. refusal to help its cause and what it perceived to be U.S. support for Great Britain, began attacking American ships. As soon as he became president, Adams sent agents to France to resolve the disagreement, but the French government refused to meet with them. When secret agents of the French government demanded

Adams, John | 3



that the United States agree to loan France $10 million and pay a bribe of $250,000 before talks could begin, Adams relayed the insult to Congress. The incident became known as the XYZ Affair, after the initials Adams substituted in his report for the names of the French secret agents. Adams’s popularity soared as he strengthened the nation’s defenses, although he himself was against war. He nominated Washington as commander in chief of the army and supported a naval buildup. Between 1798 and 1800, an undeclared naval war, known as the QuasiWar, raged between the United States and France. Full-scale war seemed inevitable, but by 1800, passions had cooled. Napoleon had gained control in France and, preoccupied with other matters, wanted peace with the United States. Adams seized the opportunity to negotiate a peaceful resolution to the situation. Although a wise decision for the nation, it was a costly one politically. Adams’s action infuriated Hamilton and his Federalist supporters, who had been pressing for war. But it was characteristic of Adams to choose his country over self-interest. However, the beginning of hostilities with the French in 1798 also had enabled the Federalists to push through Congress the repressive Alien and Sedition Acts. The acts were aimed against the many foreign-born (especially French and Irish) DemocraticRepublican critics of the government and made it more difficult for them to become American citizens. The acts also allowed the government to prosecute citizens who expressed opposition to it. The laws were vigorously opposed by Jefferson and his supporters, who believed that the acts violated the First Amendment’s guarantee of free speech. Without the support of many of the Federalists and vilified by the DemocraticRepublicans for not vetoing the Alien and

Sedition Acts, Adams was defeated for reelection by Jefferson in 1800. One of Adams’s final actions as president was to appoint Federalists (known as Midnight Judges) to newly created federal judgeships. The appointments were later voided. His appointment of John Marshall as chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, however, would endure for 34 years; Marshall proved to be one of the giants of the high court. Adams retired to Braintree with his wife, Abigail, after leaving the White House in 1801. He spent the last 25 years of his life farming and corresponding with friends, among them Jefferson, with whom he enjoyed a warm reconciliation, writing about contemporary affairs, and recording his experiences in politics. Adams died in Quincy, Massachusetts, on July 4, 1826, exactly 50 years to the day from the signing of the Declaration of Independence. His last words are reported to have been “Thomas Jefferson still survives.” He did not know that Jefferson had succumbed about five hours earlier on that very day. Adams’s son, John Quincy, would go on to serve in Congress and as president of the United States (1825–1829); his grandson, Charles Francis Adams, was also an eminent American statesman. Steven G. O’Brien

Further Reading Adams, John. Diary and Autobiography of John Adams. 4 vols. Edited by L. H. Butterfield. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1961. Ellis, Joseph J. Passionate Sage: The Character and Personality of John Adams. New York: Norton, 1993. Hutson, James. John Adams and the Diplomacy of the American Revolution. Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1980. McCullough, David. John Adams. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2001.

| Adams, Samuel 4 Morris, Richard B. The Peacemakers: The Great Powers and American Independence. New York: Harper and Row, 1965. Ryerson, Richard Alan. John Adams and the Founding of the Republic. Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society, 2001.

Adams, Samuel(1722–1803) Popular Patriot, fiery revolutionary leader, and a propagandist who was at the center of every major act of colonial defiance in Boston in the decade leading up to the American Revolution, Samuel Adams was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on September 27, 1722, a cousin to fellow Patriot John Adams. He graduated from Harvard College in

Samuel Adams, one of the revolution’s most famous agitators, advocated full independence from Britain, helped found the Sons of Liberty, and opposed Parliamentary legislation that imposed a range of taxes on the American colonies. He served in both the First and Second Continental Congresses and was a signatory of the Declaration of Independence. (Library of Congress)

1740, where he also obtained his master’s degree three years later. He then began studying law but gave it up. Adams also failed at running his own business, and after inheriting his father’s brewery business and property, he managed it so poorly that he soon fell into debt and was reduced to relying on friends to provide for his family, a situation he frequently found himself in throughout his life. In 1747, Adams became influential in local politics and began writing newspaper articles on current affairs. In 1756, he became tax collector for Boston, a position that required him to personally make up any shortfalls in the revenue. His continuing propensity to grant citizens extra time to pay their taxes or forgive citizens’ taxes altogether resulted in an eventual debt to the colonial government of £8,000. In 1764, Adams embarked on a more active role in the colony’s politics, primarily in protest of the British government’s plans to increase taxation of the North American colonists. Sometime in the early 1760s, he had joined a small social group called the Caucus Club, which met to discuss the politics of the day. This group gradually became the center of colonial resistance in Boston, and Adams emerged as the leader of radical politics in the colony. In 1765, Adams organized colonial protests against the Stamp Act, writing declarations reaffirming the colonists’ rights within the British Empire and orchestrating public demonstrations against the act. Although his involvement could never be proven, many believed that he was behind the outbreak of violence in Boston in August of that year that culminated in the intimidation of Stamp Distributor Andrew Oliver into resigning his post and the sacking of Lieutenant Governor Thomas Hutchinson’s house. These so-called Stamp



Act riots sparked similar demonstrations throughout North America and established Adams as one of the primary figures behind colonial resistance to the Crown. On September 27, 1765, Adams was elected to the lower house of the Massachusetts colonial legislature. As a member of the legislature, he worked to fill the house with radicals; fought against the Townshend Acts, the revenue acts passed by Parliament to replace the repealed Stamp Act; and drafted letters to the assemblies of other colonies. He also organized the nonimportation agreement, by which colonists refused to buy goods imported from Great Britain, and propagated the distribution of the Circular Letter to all of the colonial assemblies, urging them to work together in defense of their rights. Adams formulated the basic premises for the break with Britain as early as 1765. When popular support for confrontation with the Crown periodically died down during the late 1760s and early 1770s, he kept the controversy alive with a steady stream of essays warning people against being lulled into accepting British tyranny. His lurid (and often false) depictions of British outrages committed on the people of Boston kept the controversy in the public eye. Adams’s greatest triumph as an agitator occurred on December 16, 1773, when Bostonians protested against the hated tea tax by refusing to allow ships carrying British tea to unload their cargoes in Boston. Following a heated town meeting in which various proposals for dealing with the tea were discussed, Adams announced, “This meeting can do nothing more to save the country.” His words were a prearranged signal to other members of the meeting, who promptly rose and walked out. Later that night, a number of residents, thinly disguised as Native Americans, dumped the

Adams, Samuel | 5

offending tea into Boston Harbor. The Boston Tea Party, as the episode quickly became known, outraged the British government and prompted Parliament to pass the Coercive Acts the following spring, legislation that practically abolished selfgovernment in Massachusetts. In response, colonial legislatures decided that representatives from each colony must meet to discuss their relationship with Great Britain and decide on measures for the protection of their rights. At Adams’s urging, an intercolonial congress was called, known as the First Continental Congress. He and four other delegates were chosen to represent Massachusetts. Before leaving for Philadelphia (where the congress was being held), Adams was active in organizing the convention that adopted the Suffolk Resolves on September 9, 1774, thereby placing Massachusetts in a state of virtual rebellion. In Philadelphia, he used his influence to commit the Continental Congress to approval of the Suffolk Resolves. Reelected to the Second Continental Congress, Adams returned to Philadelphia in 1775. He proposed a confederation of the colonies in favor of immediate independence and later signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776. Once the break with Great Britain was achieved, Adams’s political influence began to wane. He served in the Continental Congress until 1781 and then returned to Boston, where he was a delegate to the convention that drafted the Massachusetts Constitution. Under the new Massachusetts government, he served as a senator and member of the council. He supported the adoption of the U.S. Constitution of 1787, with the provision that the Bill of Rights be added. He failed to win election to the U.S. Congress in 1788, but he was elected

| Arnold, Benedict 6 lieutenant governor of Massachusetts in 1789 and governor in 1794, the office from which he retired to private life in 1797. Adams died on October 2, 1803, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Steven G. O’Brien

Further Reading Alexander, John K. Samuel Adams: America’s Revolutionary Politician. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002. Ammerman, David. In the Common Cause: American Response to the Coercive Acts of 1774. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1974. Brown, Richard D. Revolutionary Politics in Massachusetts: The Boston Committee of Correspondence and the Towns, 1772– 1774. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970.

Arnold, Benedict(1741–1801) Benedict Arnold was an officer in both the Continental Army and then the British Army. He was born in Norwich, Connecticut, on January 14, 1741. A difficult and rebellious youth, he enlisted in the Connecticut Militia at age 15. He served in the French and Indian War (1754–1763), although he did not see battle. Later, he became a pharmacist and a bookseller in New Haven. In 1774, he was elected captain of a Connecticut Militia company. With the beginning of the American Revolutionary War, Arnold joined the Patriot cause. Proud, vain, and extremely sensitive to criticism, he was nonetheless an effective planner and brilliant field leader. Arnold conceived a plan to attack British-held Fort Ticonderoga and secure its cannon to use against the British in the siege of Boston. Commissioned a lieutenant colonel of militia by Massachusetts, he teamed with Ethan

Allen, who had the same idea, and they and their men took Ticonderoga on May 10, 1775. In the summer of 1775, various plans were developed for a Patriot invasion of Canada. Arnold submitted his own to General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, and secured command of the smaller of two forces sent into Canada. Commissioned a colonel in the Continental Army, Arnold set out with 1,051 men on an epic march through the Maine wilderness to Quebec (September 13–November 14, 1775). He nearly succeeded in taking Quebec and with it all of Canada. Joining forces with the western prong of the American invasion commanded by Brigadier General Richard Montgomery, Arnold was wounded in a desperate assault on the city on December 31, 1775, in which Montgomery was killed. On January 10, 1776, Congress appointed Arnold a brigadier general. Arnold remained in Canada until the spring of 1776 and the arrival of British reinforcements. He then oversaw the building of, and then commanded, a small flotilla of some 15 gondolas and galleys that met the British on Lake Champlain in one of the most important battles of the war (October 11–13, 1776). Although Arnold’s vessels were destroyed, he had delayed the British advance southward down Lake Champlain, perhaps preventing an invasion of New York that fall and saving the Patriot cause. Brave, even reckless, in battle, Arnold made enemies through his lack of tact and imperious manner. He also failed to understand the workings of state and national politics as they affected the military. When he fell victim to a quota system and was unfairly passed over for promotion to major general, Arnold saw only the work of enemies and a nation’s ingratitude. Congress finally promoted him to major general on

Arnold, Benedict | 7



May 2, 1777, but this did not restore his seniority. A bitter Arnold temporarily resigned his commission in July. Named by Washington to go to upstate New York and assist in arresting British lieutenant general John Burgoyne’s invasion of that state, Arnold returned to service. Dispatched by Continental Army major general Philip Schuyler to the Mohawk Valley, Arnold raised the siege of Fort Stanwix (Fort Schuyler), New York, on August 23, 1777, then swiftly returned to the Hudson River area to play a key role in stopping the main British force under Burgoyne. In the ensuing Battle of Freeman’s Farm (First Battle of Saratoga) on September 19, 1777, Arnold commanded the American left wing and brought Burgoyne’s advance to a halt. He also openly quarreled with the new American commander, Major General Horatio Gates, and threatened to leave the army. Acting without orders, Arnold rallied American forces to help win the Battle of Bemis Heights (Second Battle of Saratoga) on October 7, 1777, where he was again injured in the same leg wounded at Quebec. Restored to seniority on the major generals’ list by Congress in November 1777, Arnold was appointed military governor of Philadelphia after the British evacuated the city in June 1778. He was soon accused of questionable financial dealings and subjected to a court-martial. In January 1780, he was cleared of all but two minor charges. While in Philadelphia, Arnold met and married Loyalist sympathizer Peggy Shippen, and together they conceived a plan for him to turn traitor. This called for Arnold to secure command of West Point, New York, and deliver the fortress, its garrison, and probably Washington himself to the British. Arnold secured the West Point command on August 3, 1780, but a series of accidents led to the plot’s discovery late the next month.

Learning of the arrest of his British liaison, Major John André, who was later hanged, Arnold escaped aboard a British warship in the Hudson on September 24, 1780, and then accepted a commission as a brigadier general in the British Army. He principally fought in Virginia, where he took Richmond in January 1781 and destroyed considerable property. He also led a bloody raid on New London, Connecticut (September 6, 1781). Arnold had requested leave to go to England to convey his thoughts on the war to the secretary of state for the American Department, Lord George Germain. The Arnolds sailed in December 1781. Arnold was received at court and made a favorable impression with the Lord Frederick North ministry then in power. Arnold urged King George III and Germain to continue the war. But when North fell from power, Arnold found himself cast aside and retired as a colonel on half pay. He then went to Canada and settled at St. John, New Brunswick, where he began a trading business. Peggy and their children later joined him there, but the business was a failure. In 1791, they returned to England. After Britain went to war with France in 1793, Arnold made three attempts to secure an active commission in the British Army, but these all ended in failure. Arnold died in London of dropsy and gout on June 14, 1801, his name synonymous with “traitor.” Quite possibly the finest field commander on either side in the American Revolutionary War, though flawed by hubris and ambition, Arnold never found the fame he sought. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Boylan, Bryan Richard. Benedict Arnold: The Dark Eagle. New York: Norton, 1973.

| Articles of Confederation 8 Flexner, James Thomas. The Traitor and the Spy: Benedict Arnold and John Andre. Boston: Little, Brown, 1975. Martin, James Kirby. Benedict Arnold, Revolutionary Hero: An American Warrior Reconsidered. New York: New York University Press, 1997. Randall, Willard Sterne. Benedict Arnold: Patriot and Traitor. New York: Morrow, 1990.

Articles of Confederation The Articles of Confederation were the country’s first national constitution and government. They were developed and adopted during the American Revolutionary War, between 1777 and 1781. In 1776, representatives of the 13 colonies met in Philadelphia as the Second Continental Congress to adopt the Declaration of Independence. Meanwhile, a committee led by John Dickinson of Pennsylvania drafted the document that later became known as the Articles of Confederation, which created a national government called the Congress of the Confederation. On November 15, 1777, Congress approved the Articles of Confederation and then sent the document to the states for ratification. The Articles of Confederation were officially ratified on July 9, 1778, by 10 states (Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire), followed by New Jersey on November 26, 1778, and Delaware on February 23, 1779. Maryland held off two years more, acceding to them on March 1, 1781. In practice, the Articles of Confederation went into effect in 1777, but it was not until 1781 that all 13 states had ratified them. Article I of the Articles of Confederation stipulated that the 13 original British colonies would be called the United States of

America. Article II affirmed that “each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this Confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled.” This meant that all powers and rights not given to Congress in the Articles were reserved to the states. The Articles of Confederation constituted overwhelmingly a states’ rights system, as the states had more power than Congress. Therefore, the union among the states created by the Articles of Confederation was very weak. In the wake of the Declaration of Independence of 1776 and the ongoing American Revolution, there was no way that Americans of that time would have entertained the creation of a strong, powerful national government. Under the Articles of Confederation, the unicameral Congress consisted of delegates from each of the 13 states, and these delegates voted as states, not as individuals (thus, there were 13 votes). Most measures passed by Congress required 9 of 13 votes, but amendments or changes to the Articles of Confederation required the unanimity of all 13 states, effectively making it impossible to amend the Articles of Confederation. Under the Articles of Confederation, Congress was a single branch of government (the executive was composed of a committee of members of Congress; there was no national judiciary or court system) and had the power to conduct foreign affairs, make treaties, declare war, maintain a military establishment, coin money (but the states also had this right), and establish post offices. Nonetheless, the Articles of Confederation had very limited national powers because they lacked fiscal power and had insufficient administrative structures or bureaucracy to even carry out basic functions. For example, Congress could not raise money by collecting taxes or taxing



imported goods, had no control over trade between states and with foreign countries, and could not force the states to comply with national laws because there were only state courts, no national courts. Two states could appeal to Congress to resolve an interstate dispute, but there was no way for Congress to enforce its decision. Thus, the national government was essentially dependent on the willingness of the states to comply with its measures, and the states often refused to cooperate. The Articles of Confederation frequently required a specific number of states to vote in favor of any significant legislation for it to pass. Nine was the minimum number required to agree to matters such as declaring war, making treaties, admitting new states, and coining and borrowing money. Several attempts to change the Articles of Confederation prior to the adoption of the Constitution of 1787 had failed because of a single state’s refusal to agree to the changes. The American Revolutionary War officially ended with the Treaty of Paris on September 3, 1783, in which Great Britain recognized the United States’ independence. Postwar issues, both economic and political, brought increased pressures on the new government, which was not equipped to handle such problems. Thus, calls for reform, if not abolition, of the Articles of Confederation came from such luminaries as George Washington, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton, who feared that the United States was sliding toward anarchy or even civil war and that the newly achieved independence could be lost without a stronger, more powerful national government. Certainly, the Articles of Confederation contained flaws that had to be addressed. Congress had no independent power of taxation, relying instead on the good faith of the states to pay taxes to the national

Articles of Confederation | 9

government as requested. Often, however, such requests for funds were ignored by states, and because the national government had no power of enforcement, little could be done to force their hand. Very quickly, then, Congress defaulted on the nation’s considerable debts, which were essentially state debts owed to foreign nations that had been assumed or taken over by Congress, along with loans that Congress procured from France and other countries to finance the American War of Independence. The Articles of Confederation also did not provide sufficient authority for dealing with nonpayment of state debts to foreign countries, namely Britain, resulting in encroachment by the British on the northern and western borders of the United States and also by the Spanish on the southern borders of the United States. The United States also had no power to regulate commerce among the states or with foreign countries, leading to bitter tariff and trade wars among the states, especially between New York and New Jersey. Combined with inflation and the economic depression that set in after the American Revolutionary War ended, this economic crisis paralleled the nation’s political crisis, as efforts to reform the Articles of Confederation were continually frustrated. In January 1786, Virginia called for a meeting of the states at Annapolis, Maryland, to discuss modification of the Articles of Confederation. The meeting was only attended by five states, so little was achieved. Afterward, a popular uprising that began in Massachusetts and was led by the bankrupt farmer and former captain in the Continental Army Daniel Shays precipitated a bona fide political and military crisis because the government under the Articles of Confederation was unable to respond to the revolt. This finally prompted the states

10 | Artillery, Land

to formally reconsider the Articles of Confederation. Alarmed that Shays’ Rebellion might have spread throughout the country, Congress called for a convention to meet on May 14, 1787, in Philadelphia for the purpose of amending the Articles of Confederation. However, the Philadelphia Convention completely abolished the Articles of Confederation, drafted the new U.S. Constitution, and created a new and more powerful national government. The U.S. Constitution went into effect on March 4, 1789. Perhaps the greatest achievement of the Articles of Confederation was the establishment of land ordinances during 1784–1785 and then enactment of the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, which dealt with the Northwest Territory and how it would later be organized into future states. This became the model for how western territories would subsequently become new states. As such, the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 established the principle of political and legal equality between the settlers of western territories (later organized into new states) and the residents of the existing states. Stefan M. Brooks

Further Reading Middlekauff, Robert. The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763–1789. New York: Oxford University Press, 2007. Rakove, Jack. Revolutionaries: A New History of the Invention of America. New York: Mariner Books, 2011. Wood, Gordon. The American Revolution. New York: Modern Library, 2003.

Artillery, Land The artillery used during the American Revolutionary War was little changed from a century earlier, both in the types of

weapons and in the techniques of firing them. Artillery had limited mobility and slow rates of fire. Maximum ranges seldom exceeded 2,000 yards, and maximum effective ranges were closer to 700 yards. Moreover, the smoothbore, muzzle-loading, black powder guns were dangerous to fire, often exploding and killing the gun crews. As today, there were three basic types or categories of artillery: cannon, howitzers, and mortars. Cannon were long-barreled weapons that fired at long ranges with a relatively flat trajectory. They were employed against tightly packed troop formations, fortifications, and ships offshore. Howitzers were medium-length weapons that fired at slower velocity but with more arched trajectories. Their higher angles of fire made them effective against targets behind hills and obstacles, and their ability to fire both solid shot and exploding shell made them especially effective against troops. Mortars were short-barreled, short-range weapons that fired from fixed mounts at 45 degrees of elevation. Firing exploding shell only, mortars were employed against troops behind obstacles or in trenches. Range was adjusted by varying the amount of the charge. Cannon were classified by the weight of their projectile. Thus, a 12-pounder fired a solid shot weighing 12 pounds. Howitzers and mortars were usually classified by bore diameter, such as 10 inch. Guns were manufactured in both bronze and iron. Bronze (a mixture of copper and tin) was the preferred metal for land service artillery. Bronze guns were lighter than those of iron, and the metal was more forgiving in that it was more likely to bulge than explode if defective. Because of their lighter weight alone, bronze guns were preferred for field service. But iron guns were far less expensive than those of bronze.



Because of this and because mobility was not usually an important factor for these weapons, the large siege, fortress, and seacoast defense pieces and ship guns were usually made of iron during the Revolutionary War period. Virtually all cannon of the American Revolution were muzzle loading, and all were smoothbore. Howitzers and mortars both had a powder chamber, a small recess at the base of the bore to hold the powder charge. Black powder was the primary propellant, a composition of saltpeter (potassium nitrate), charcoal, and sulfur, with the standard ratio being 6:1:1. By the time of the American Revolutionary War, prepackaged powder charges were usually made up in a flannel bag. Paper and parchment cartridges were also in use. Flannel had the great advantage of burning cleanly and leaving no residue in the tube. The cartridge was inserted into the bore and then pushed home with a rammer staff. A wad was rammed home after that, followed by the projectile, most commonly solid shot. A cannon might be double shotted for very close-range fire. The gun was then laid for range and direction. It could be elevated by means of handspikes and a wooden wedge known as a quoin, although some carriages, most notably those for howitzers, were equipped with metal elevating screws. The gun could be adjusted horizontally by lifting the trail and moving it left or right by means of drag ropes and handspikes to be pointed in the proper direction. A typical 6-pounder field piece of the Revolutionary War era had a crew of 10–12 men, with an officer commanding two guns, and either four or six guns in an artillery company. A well-trained crew could fire as many as 12 unaimed rounds a minute. Unaimed fire was effective enough at pointblank range (the point where a shot would

Artillery, Land | 11

hit the ground with the gun in perfectly horizontal position), but longer ranges, which required elevation of the gun, necessitated aimed fire, which reduced rates of fire. Sustained rates of fire in combat averaged one or two rounds per minute. To fire the gun, the gunner pricked the cartridge with a sharp metal object known as a priming wire through the touch hole or vent at the breech end of the bore. He then poured loose, finely grained gunpowder down the touch hole and used a slow match to touch it off. Sometimes gunners employed quill tubes or tubes of tin filled with powder, quick match, or portfire solution. Gun crews had to be careful not to get in the way of the gun when it recoiled. There was considerable backward movement on firing, after which the gun had to be hauled back into position and resighted. Before reloading the gun, the crew first swabbed it out with a wet sponge on the other end of the rammer staff to extinguish any burning residue. A screwlike device known as a worm was used to extract any obstructions from the bore. The powder— either in the form of loose powder in a powder ladle with a long rod, which was then turned over at the base of the bore, or in the form of a powder bag with a prefixed charge—was then rammed home by the opposite end of the sponge while the ventsman placed his thumb on the vent to prevent any rush of air that might cause a premature explosion because of burning remnants in the bore that had escaped the sponging. A sharp-pointed instrument known as a picker was used to pierce the fabric of the powder bag to make ignition more certain. A wad and cannonball would then be rammed home. Cannon were direct-fire weapons; that is, the gun crew could only fire on what they were able to see. Gunner’s quadrants and

12 | Artillery, Land

other devices helped with accuracy of fire. Still, windage, or the distance between the diameter of the projectile and the diameter of the bore, ensured that the ball bounded down the bore and might take off at the muzzle with a slight angle of deflection, producing inherent inaccuracy at longer ranges. Lugs on each side of the gun tube, known as trunnions and usually of the same diameter as the bore and of equal length, held the gun and howitzer in its carriage. Some guns, most commonly land artillery, had handles cast on the top of the barrel to enable them to be lifted from their carriages for mounting and remounting. These were sometimes known as dolphins. Most field pieces were mounted on wooden split trail carriages of oak or some other hardwood and with large wheels that facilitated movement over difficult terrain. Cannon in forts, which did not need to be transported over distances, were mounted on garrison carriages with small wheels known as trucks, similar to those used aboard ships. When field guns had to be moved any significant distance, their gun carriages were attached by their trails to two-wheeled horse-drawn vehicles called limbers. These transformed the gun carriages into four-wheeled vehicles. Some ready ammunition was carried in removable boxes mounted on the sides of the gun carriage. Ammunition wagons and powder carts carried the full ammunition loads necessary for firing. Traveling forges manned by field artificers made any necessary field repairs.

Artillery Ammunition Artillery pieces fired a variety of projectiles. The most common was the cast-iron solid

sphere known as shot. It was particularly effective against fixed emplacements and ships and for battering down the walls of a fort. It was not especially effective against individual infantry targets, but it was deadly against the standard shoulder-to-shoulder infantry assault formation of the day when firing from enfilade. When fired from the lowest practical angle of elevation, shot hit the ground and continued to bounce over the battlefield, killing, maiming, and disorganizing enemy infantry and artillery crews. Solid shot heated in special mobile furnaces, called hot shot, was especially effective for setting fire to ships and igniting the roofs of buildings. Hot shot was a hollow sphere with vents that was packed with a composition designed to burn at a high temperature and was difficult to extinguish. An explosive shell was also a hollow sphere; it was filled with a bursting charge and detonated by a powder-burning time fuse. Around the time of the American Revolutionary War, rather than having to light the fuse ahead of time and then ram it home, the fuse was simply lit by the burning gases of the gun’s main charge flowing around the shell, thanks to the bore’s windage. This was quick, more efficient, and safer for the crews. Grapeshot was extremely effective against troops at close range and cavalry attacks. A grape round consisted of 9–12 small iron balls packed around a central wooden spindle and held in place by netting. The whole round resembled a bunch of grapes. On firing, the netting and the spindle fell away, scattering the balls. Grape was employed when attacking enemy infantry closed to within about 200 yards. The other type of scatterable antipersonnel round was called canister, or case shot. It usually consisted of a thin metal cylinder



filled with iron balls, musket balls, or even small bits of scrap metal and stones. Upon firing, the canister broke apart, scattering its contents like a giant shotgun. It was fired at close ranges, usually under 100 yards. Transportation of artillery was one of the major logistical problems during the American Revolutionary War, especially considering the primitive roads of North America at the time. During the siege of Boston, Patriot forces moved heavy guns captured at Fort Ticonderoga from the fort to Boston during the winter of 1776 on sledges pulled through the snow by oxen. Because they were relatively immobile, guns were often overrun by attacking enemy infantry during the course of a battle. When a gun was about to be overrun, the standard procedure was to spike it to prevent the enemy from immediately using it. Likewise, enemy infantry who captured a gun intact might spike it themselves if they thought they would not be able to hold on to it or take it off the field. Spiking was accomplished by jamming an obstruction into the tube’s firing vent. All gun crews carried special spiking tools long enough to reach the bottom of the bore and bend over when hammered home, making the spike impossible to remove without special artificer tools. As a hasty substitute, the point of a bayonet was jammed into the vent and then snapped off. Spiking rarely put a gun out of action for more than a few hours. The British fielded a wide variety of guns cast from both iron and bronze. The Board of Ordnance establishment of 1764 recognized 11 different calibers: 0.5-, 1.5-, 3-, 4-, 6-, 9-, 12-, 18-, 24-, 21-, and 42-pounders. Of these, all but the 1.5-pounders were cast in iron; the 1.5-pounder was only cast in bronze. There were also bronze 3-, 6-, 12-, 24-, and 42-pounders.

Artillery, Land | 13

The Royal Artillery also fielded howitzers and mortars. The standard howitzer calibers were 8 and 10 inches. Mortars came in a number of sizes, the smallest of which was the 4.5-inch Coehorn, named for Dutch artillerist Baron Menno van Coehoorn (1641–1704). It was a light mortar designed to be carried by two men and could be used to drop shells into enemy trenches or field fortifications. Other mortars included the 5.8-inch royal mortars and the 8-, 10-, and 12-inch mortars, which were primarily used in siege work. In addition, the British Army used 2.25- and 3.5-inch mortars to launch hand grenades. Although these do not appear in the official artillery regulations, such weapons were employed in the American Revolutionary War, and tests with surviving mortars indicate that they were effective weapons capable of propelling grenades farther than they could be hurled by hand. The chief American problem regarding artillery at the start of the war was a shortage of guns. The Americans had to make do with what they had. During the war, the Continental Army was forced to rely on leftover relics from the colonial era, older French cannon smuggled past the Royal Navy blockade, guns cast in America, and some pieces captured from British forces, including those taken from supply ships. Cannon cast in the few American foundries tended to follow British designs, especially the shorter and lighter guns. The Continental Army received more than 200 cannon and 29 mortars from France. Among these were some light Swedish 5-pounders manufactured for the French Army. Among the most important of the captured ordnance were 78 serviceable guns, ranging from 4- to 14-pounders, taken at Fort Ticonderoga early in the war.

14 | Artillery, Naval

Transported to Boston and placed on Dorchester Heights, their presence made the British position untenable. French artillery was as advanced as any in the world. The French siege train at Yorktown in 1781 reportedly included 12 24-pounders, 8 16-pounders, and 16 mortars. Although six German artillery companies fought in the war on the British side, they were only armed with light guns for infantry support, believed to be solely 4-pounders, probably of Swedish manufacture. Paul J. Springer, Spencer C. Tucker, and David T. Zabecki

Further Reading Colby, C. B. Revolutionary War Weapons: Pole Arms, Hand Guns, Shoulder Arms, and Artillery. New York: Coward-McCann, 1963. Fortescue, J. W. The War of Independence: The British Army in North America, 1775– 1783. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole, 2001. Gooding, S. James. An Introduction to British Artillery in North America. Ottawa, ON: Museum Restoration Service, 1972. Hogg, Ian V. A History of Artillery. New York: Hamlyn, 1974. Peterson, Harold L. Round Shot and Rammers. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole, 1969. Wright, Robert K., Jr. The Continental Army. Washington, DC: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1893.

Artillery, Naval Guns employed aboard ships during the American Revolutionary War were similar to those on land, although the vast majority of the larger ship guns were of iron. Casting in iron had improved, and iron was far less expensive than bronze. Although iron was

heavier than bronze, weight was not as much of a factor at sea as when moving field artillery by land. As on land, guns were denominated by the weight of the solid shot they fired rather than by the diameter of the gun bore, as is common today. The largest British long gun in common use at sea during the period was the 42-pounder. Broadside guns were mounted on stout wooden carriages that were quite similar in the various navies. The gun was secured in its mount by two lugs, known as trunnions, that were cast on the gun slightly in advance of the balance point and that projected at right angles from the axis of the bore. Trunnions were locked in place on the sides of the carriage by metal cap squares. Opinions differed as to the precise placement of the trunnions in relationship to the bore. British guns had slightly less recoil because they were quarter hung—that is, the trunnions were slightly below the axis of the bore and thus produced downward pressure on the breech. A gun could be repositioned aboard ships by means of its carriage’s four small wooden wheels, known as trucks, and then aimed laterally by means of metal handspikes and tackle. When the gun was fired, the friction of the wooden trucks on the deck helped minimize recoil, which was finally halted by a stout rope known as breeching. (In French practice, the breeching did not pass around the gun but instead passed through holes in the middle of the carriage cheeks.) Changes in elevation were effected by means of the wooden wedge known as a quoin inserted underneath the breech end of the gun. Carriage dimensions were determined by precise formulas in direct proportion to the diameter of the shot their guns fired. Sloops mounted their guns on a single deck. To aid in the stability of the vessel, in



frigates and ships of the line (those warships with more than one gun deck), the heaviest guns were mounted on the lowest deck. The lower gun deck(s) were pierced by square ports known as gun ports. When the cannon were not run out, these were closed by gun port lids or shutters. On the upper deck, the guns pointed through ports in the bulwarks. The strongly reinforced bulwarks provided limited protection for the gun crews during action, as did their hammocks secured in netting above the bulwarks. The men were, however, vulnerable to plunging fire from smaller pieces set in the fighting tops of larger vessels or from small-arms fire from an opposing ship’s marines, who would have also climbed into the fighting tops. Most personnel casualties in battles at sea were produced by showers of wooden splinters. To help minimize the psychological effect on gun crews of the casualties in very close quarters aboard ships, ship carriages were painted a dark blood-red color. Most of the guns aboard ships were mounted in rows to fire to port and starboard. This broadside fire provided the most stability for the vessel and maximized the damage that could be inflicted. One or more long pieces, known as chase guns, were situated on the top deck forward to engage an enemy ship at long range in pursuit. A few guns were also set at the stern to provide some protection there. (Bow and stern were actually the two weakest parts of the ships structurally.) Broadside fire dictated the naval tactics of the day. Larger ships were rated according to the number of guns they carried. The largest were the first-rate ships of the line, mounting 100 guns or more. The smallest-rated ship was the sixth-rate, mounting as few as

Artillery, Naval | 15

20 guns. However, the number of guns varied from ship to ship regardless of rate because the captains flouted regulations to mount the most effective mix of ordnance considered best suited for their ship. For some captains, it was also a matter of prestige, so they crowded aboard as many guns as possible. Thus, warships usually exceeded their rates. Armament also often changed, sometimes dramatically, during the life of a warship. A mix of calibers presented problems, and there was some effort to move toward fewer types aboard ships. The Continental Navy and the 11 state navies of the American Revolutionary War were, however, a notable exception. On the Patriot side, cannon were in short supply, and American captains put to sea with whatever guns they were fortunate enough to secure. Most naval guns of the period were long guns. Small howitzers carried in the fighting tops of larger vessels were employed as antipersonnel weapons. In American service, such guns were often referred to as “Coehorns,” for Dutch artillerist Baron Menno van Coehoorn (1641–1704). Small antipersonnel guns known as swivels, for their pivoting mounts, were of cannon form and placed in the rails of smaller vessels. Howitzers and swivels were normally not counted as part of a ship’s armament rating. As on land, gun lengths varied considerably. Chase guns, which had to have the greatest range, were always the longest, while lower-deck guns were the shortest. Guns of the same caliber varied dramatically in length with different classes, depending on their placement aboard ships. The ideal weight of long guns was thought to be about 200 pounds of metal per 1 pound of shot.

16 | Artillery, Naval

Projectiles for guns at sea principally consisted of solid shot, but grapeshot and case shot (or canister; see the description in the “Artillery, Land” entry) were available for close actions. Because of its danger to crews in confined spaces, explosive shell was not employed in long guns. There were also disabling shot and chain shot, which were designed to damage spars and carry away the rigging of an enemy vessel. The former might consist of two hemispheres attached together by a long iron bar. It would tumble in flight and tear rigging and break spars. Chain shot was usually two balls connected with a long chain. The most common projectile for engaging another vessel was solid shot, and in close actions, guns might be double or even triple shotted, especially in the opening exchange of fire. Shot could also be heated in special furnaces aboard ships. Hot shot was employed in an effort to set an enemy ship on fire. Holes from round shot could usually be easily patched with plugs by the ship’s carpenter. Warships of the age of fighting sail could absorb a tremendous amount of punishment and were thus rarely sunk in battle; those that did sink most often succumbed to fire or the explosion of a magazine. Most of the personnel casualties aboard a ship during an action were usually inflicted by clouds of wooden splinters. Heavy human losses that enabled a ship to be taken by boarding or a ship becoming disabled by loss of masts and rigging were generally the principal reasons for a captain to surrender his ship during an engagement. Generally speaking, crew size meant that the large broadside guns could only be effectively fought on one side of the ship at a time. Thus, a ship doubled—that is, with an enemy warship on both sides of it at once—was at a considerable disadvantage.

Speed of loading was most important in battle, and well-trained crews often made the difference in an engagement’s outcome. Most ship battles of the period occurred at close range, almost at dueling pistol range, and frightful losses could result. Specialized ordnance included mortars for shore-bombardment purposes. Carried in special ships known as bomb vessels, or simply bombs, their most common sizes were 10 and 13 inches. Sea mortars generally fired exploding shell. Most were of bronze. American naval guns of the Revolutionary War were of many types from a wide variety of sources. A number were foreign purchases or gifts, some were borrowed from the army and land fortifications, others were manufactured locally, and still others were secured by capture. Many were quite old and dangerous to their crews. Most of the guns were also small, for the Continental Navy had no ships of the line; its largest warships were frigates, and the largest cannon in common use aboard Continental Navy ships was the 12-pounder. Most of the guns cast in American foundries seem to have been copied from British designs. Ship batteries were also very eclectic. Thus, the frigate Confederacy of 36 guns (28 12-pounders and 8 6-pounders) went to sea armed with 2 6-pounders from the wreck of the frigate Columbus, a 12-pounder borrowed from the army, and other 12-pounders taken from a captured British galley. Some Continental Navy warships had to remain in port for months until they could complete their armaments. This was not the case with the for-profit privateers, the owners of which seemed to always be able to purchase the guns they needed. A number of the cannon in Brigadier General Benedict Arnold’s flotilla of galleys

Artillery, Naval | 17



and gondolas (gundalow) on Lake Champlain in 1776 were those captured from the British at the beginning of the war from Forts Ticonderoga and Crown Point. One of Arnold’s gondolas, the Philadelphia, was recovered and now resides in the Smithsonian Institution. This army vessel is sometimes heralded as the first U.S. Navy warship. Its slide-mounted 12-pounder at the bow and two carriage-mounted 9-pounder broadside guns are believed to be of Swedish manufacture. The captains of some American warships were fortunate to receive modern ordnance directly from French arsenals. Captain John Paul Jones was not as fortunate. At least one of the six large, old 18-pounders he secured from the French for the Bonhomme Richard blew up during the battle with the Serapis, possibly from having been double shotted, and nearly cost Jones the engagement. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Boudriot, Jean. “L’Artillerie de Mer de la Marine Française, 1674–1856.” Triton, no. 645, 1st trimester (1968), supplement to Neptunia, no. 89: 1–11. Caruana, Adrian B. The History of English Sea Ordnance, 1523–1875. Vol. 2, The Age of the System, 1715–1815. Ashley Lodge, Rotherfield, East Sussex, UK: Jean Boudriot Publications, 1997. Denoix, L., and J. N. Muracciole. “Historique de l’Artillerie de la Marine de ses origines à 1870: Quatrième Période.” Mémorial de l’artillerie française 38, no. 2 (1964): 271–359. Peterson, Harold L. Roundshot and Rammers: An Introduction to Muzzle-Loading Land Artillery in the United States. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 1969. Tucker, Spencer C. Arming the Fleet: U.S. Navy Ordnance in the Muzzle-Loading Era. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1989.

B Bennington, Battle of (August 16, 1777)

of communication. Learning of Baum’s presence, Stark advanced toward the Germans. After locating Baum, Stark was successful in infiltrating several spies into the camp, which was located about four miles east of Sancoick. Posing as Loyalists, they secured accurate information on enemy numbers and dispositions. Baum, now aware of the concentration of a large militia force against him, ordered his men to fortify their position by the construction of breastworks. Unfortunately, these defensive dispositions proved faulty because Baum dispersed his men over too wide an area, allowing them to be cut off and destroyed piecemeal. However, Baum was cheered by the arrival of some 100 Loyalist reinforcements. By nightfall on August 14, the American and British forces were at a standoff. Stark’s superior numbers were offset by Baum’s strong position on high ground with earthworks manned by professional soldiers supported by cannon. On August 15, it rained heavily all day, and both sides waited for it to clear. Baum spent the day improving and expanding his position on what became known as “Hessian Hill” and posting a small force of Loyalists on a lower hill across the river, which came to be known as the “Tory Fort.” At 9:00 a.m., on August 15, Burgoyne’s relief force set out. Commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Heinrich von Breymann, it numbered some 650 Brunswick troops and two guns. The heavily equipped Brunswick

The Battle of Bennington was an important American Revolutionary War battle that took place at Walloomsac, New York, about 10 miles from its namesake of Bennington, Vermont. The battle occurred during British lieutenant general Sir John Burgoyne’s Saratoga campaign (June 14–October 17, 1777). With his forces running desperately short of supplies, on August 11, 1777, Burgoyne sent out a foraging force of 700 Hessians, Loyalists, and Native Americans under Colonel Friedrich Baum to secure supplies and horses. At first, all went well, and Baum reported to Burgoyne that he had secured considerable food stocks. On August 14, Baum’s men scattered a force of 200 Patriot militiamen at Sancoick (Van Schaick’s Mill), New York. Although he was pleased about the arrival of Loyalist volunteers asking to be armed, Baum also learned from prisoners that some 1,500–1,800 Patriot militiamen were gathered nearby. Demonstrating contempt for his opposition, Baum informed Burgoyne that he intended to attack the far more numerous militiamen. He did, however, request reinforcements. The prisoners’ reports were accurate. Near Bennington, Vermont, New Hampshire Militia brigadier general John Stark had raised a force of some 1,500 men, more than 10 percent of the entire male population of New Hampshire. Colonel Seth Warner also raised 400 militiamen, and he and Stark laid plans to harass Burgoyne’s lines

19

20 | Bennington, Battle of

grenadiers were notoriously slow marchers in the best conditions, and Breymann had not been informed that there was any particular rush. In any case, the roads were a morass, and moving the ammunition wagons and cannon uphill and down in such conditions proved daunting and imposed further delay. The night of August 15 was stormy, but Stark was heartened by the arrival of some Massachusetts militiamen led by Parson Thomas Allen. The next day, a number of Stockbridge Indians also joined his force, giving him almost 2,000 men, not counting Warner’s men, who had yet to appear. The weather cleared on the afternoon of August 16, and Stark ordered a double envelopment of the Hessian position, leading the main assault in person. The attackers were aided by the fact that the Germans had been told that the Loyalists would place white paper in their hats as a means of identification. Stark learned of this and had his own men do the same. Fighting began about 3:00 p.m. The Americans gradually drove the Germans, Loyalists, and allied Indians back and took a number of the Loyalists and Indians prisoner. Then, after some two hours of combat, a lucky shot by the militia brought the destruction of the principal Hessian ammunition wagon. With their position now surrounded and running out of ammunition, Baum ordered his troops to charge with drawn sabers in the hope of breaking free. Baum, however, was himself cut down, mortally wounded, and the remainder of his men then surrendered. At 5:00 p.m., as the Americans were busy rounding up their prisoners and securing captured equipment, Breymann’s Brunswick battalion at last arrived. Catching the Americans in considerable disarray,

the Germans promptly attacked and proceeded to force Stark’s men back until the Green Mountain Boys under Warner arrived on the battlefield and attacked from the flanks. Breymann’s men fought well but, running out of ammunition, withdrew in confusion. The Battle of Bennington was a remarkable Patriot victory achieved by militiamen against professional soldiers, albeit with superior numbers. In all, the Hessians sustained 207 killed and 700 captured, and American casualties were only 30 killed and 40 wounded. The Americans also secured much-needed military supplies and weapons. In contrast, Burgoyne’s supply situation became much more difficult, ultimately prompting his surrender at Saratoga. The battle also discouraged Burgoyne’s Indian allies, who were already concerned about the slow British advance. At the same time, it greatly boosted Patriot morale and encouraged enlistments. Stark received a letter of thanks from John Hancock, president of the Continental Congress, with word that he had been granted a commission as a brigadier general in the Continental Army, a position he accepted. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Ketchum, Richard M. Saratoga: Turning Point of America’s Revolutionary War. New York: Henry Holt, 1997. Morrissey, Brendan. Saratoga 1777: Turning Point of a Revolution. Oxford, UK: Osprey, 2000. Nickerson, Hoffman. The Turning Point of the Revolution: Or, Burgoyne in America. 1928. Reprint ed. Port Washington, NY: Kennikat, 1967. Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. Edited by John Richard Alden. New York: Skyhorse, 2011.



Bonhomme Richard versus Serapis(September 23, 1779) The fight between the Bonhomme Richard and Serapis off the English coast was a key naval engagement of the American Revolutionary War. One of the more sanguinary contests of the age of fighting sail, this American victory resulted in the enshrinement of John Paul Jones as one of the great heroes in U.S. naval history. In November 1777, the 30-year-old Captain Jones had sailed the 18-gun sloop of war Ranger to France with dispatches for the American commissioners there. Then, in the spring of 1778, Jones and the Ranger carried the war to Britain. Operating from the French port of Brest, Jones took a number of British merchantmen, raided and burned the port of Whitehaven, and captured the 16-gun British sloop of war Drake, events that caused consternation in Britain and joy in America. With the support of Benjamin Franklin, the American minister plenipotentiary to France, Jones then received command of the Duc de Duras, the largest ship to fight under the American flag during the American Revolutionary War. The French government had converted it into a warship and presented or loaned the ship to the Americans. Jones renamed it the Bonhomme Richard in honor of his friend Franklin (Bonhomme Richard was the French title of Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanac). On August 14, Jones set sail from the French port of Lorient with a small squadron consisting of the Bonhomme Richard and six other French and American ships, including two French privateers, on a planned two-month commerce-raiding cruise off the British coasts. The five navy ships sailed under an agreement specifying

Bonhomme Richard versus Serapis | 21

that for the duration of the cruise, they were considered warships of the Continental Navy and bound by its regulations. The French captains held commissions issued by Franklin as Continental Navy officers. Two French privateers, the Granville and the Monsieur, that had set out with the squadron soon went their own way, and a French cutter, Le Cerf, became separated in fog. This left Jones with four ships: the Bonhomme Richard (40 guns); the Continental Navy frigate Alliance (36 guns and arguably the finest ship in the Continental Navy), under Captain Pierre Landais, a Frenchman with an American commission and American crew; the Pallas (32 guns), an ex-privateer French frigate under Captain Denis Cottineau; and the Vengeance (12 guns), a French brig under Captain Philippe Ricot. During the next five weeks, the squadron took a number of British merchantmen, including two supply vessels bound for America. By the third week of September, the ships had sailed around the west coast of Ireland, around the north coast of Scotland, and down the east coast of Scotland to the northeast coast of England as far as Hull before sailing north about 20 miles to rendezvous off Flamborough Head. On the afternoon of September 23, the squadron was near Flamborough Head, off the Yorkshire coast, when it sighted a British convoy of 41 merchantmen laden with naval stores from the Baltic and bound for the royal dockyards in southern England. Escorts for the ships included the Serapis (44 guns), commanded by Captain Richard Pearson, and the armed ship Countess of Scarborough (20 guns), under Captain Thomas Piercy. The Serapis, often identified as a frigate, was actually more powerful. A small two-decker of 886 tons, it was 140 feet in length and 38 feet in beam. It

22 | Bonhomme Richard versus Serapis

was also new, having entered service only the year before. The Serapis mounted 44 guns: 20 18-pounders on its gun deck, 22 9-pounders on the upper deck, and 2 6-pounders on the forecastle. A conversion from a civilian sloop, the Countess of Scarborough was of light construction. As Jones’s squadron closed from the south, Captain Pearson placed his two warships to landward in front of the merchantmen to allow them to escape. Jones ordered Captain Landais of the Alliance to attack the Serapis from its starboard side, while the Bonhomme Richard took up station on its port. Jones ordered Cottineau’s Pallas to engage the Countess of Scarborough. The Vengeance, which was only armed with 4-pounders, was to provide support as needed. The battle between the Bonhomme Richard and the Serapis opened at 7:15 p.m. at a range of about 100 yards. The Bonhomme Richard mounted 40 guns: 6 18-pounders, 28 12-pounders, and 6 8-pounders. The Serapis fired the first broadside, but each ship holed the other in the first exchange. The British fired a second broadside at only 20 yards. When the Bonhomme Richard returned fire, 1 and possibly 2 of its old 18-pounders blew up, probably from the strain of being double shotted. In the explosion, many of the crew were killed or wounded, and part of the ship’s side was blown out. Jones then ordered the crew to abandon the other 18-pounders, leaving the Bonhomme Richard only 12-pounders against the main British battery of 18-pounders. Sailing around the Bonhomme Richard at will, the Serapis then poured broadsides into it, exacting a frightful toll. Soon the American ship was taking on water. The two vessels then became entangled. The British beat back an attempt by Jones to board, and the ships then came apart again.

As Jones attempted to get in position to rake his opponent, the Bonhomme Richard would not respond properly, and the two ships again collided. Jones then personally lashed the vessels together, and grapples were thrown. The two ships were now starboard to starboard. Broadsides crashed out, and both crews fired small arms. Soon both ships were on fire. Meanwhile, the Pallas had taken the Countess of Scarborough. For reasons known only to Captain Landais, the Alliance had remained aloof from the action to this point, but now it appeared, only to fire three broadsides into the stern of the Bonhomme Richard and the bow of the Serapis, causing casualties on both ships. Both the Bonhomme Richard and the Serapis were now virtual wrecks. Asked to strike, Jones shouted in reply, “No, I’ll sink, but I’ll be damned if I will strike.” His statement was later recalled as “I have not yet begun to fight.” The battle had gone on for three hours, and despite horrific casualties, both captains refused to strike. At this point, the American side experienced a lucky turn when a seaman aboard the Bonhomme Richard succeeded in throwing a grenade down the main hatch of the Serapis, setting off cartridges below and taking the gun deck out of action. At 10:30 p.m., with his mainmast in danger of falling, Pearson surrendered. A total of 130 of the crew of 284 on the Serapis were either dead or wounded. The Bonhomme Richard had sustained 150 casualties out of its crew of 322. That night, the victors cut away the mainmast of the Serapis and put out any fires aboard. All six vessels then got under way, but despite frantic efforts to save it, the Bonhomme Richard continued to take on water. On the morning of September 25, Jones ordered the last of its crew transferred



to the Serapis, and the Bonhomme Richard sank shortly thereafter. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Boudriot, Jean. John Paul Jones and the Bonhomme Richard. Translated by David H. Roberts. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1987. Morison, Samuel Eliot. John Paul Jones: A Sailor’s Biography. Boston: Little, Brown, 1959. Schaeper, Thomas J. John Paul Jones and the Battle off Flamborough Head: A Reconsideration. New York: Peter Lang, 1990. Walsh, John E. Night on Fire: The First Complete Account of John Paul Jones’s Greatest Battle. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1978.

Boston, Siege of(April 19, 1775–March 17, 1776) The Patriot siege of the city of Boston, Massachusetts, began on April 19, 1775, when, after the clash at Lexington and Concord, colonial militiamen followed the British troops back to Boston and closed around the city from the land side. The Massachusetts Provincial Congress meeting at Watertown had authorized the formation of the colony’s militia regiments into what was called the Army of Observation. The wording was intended to make it appear that the Americans were not waging war against the British Crown. The army was charged with “observing” (actually containing) the 3,500 British troops in Boston under the British Army commander in North America, Lieutenant General Thomas Gage. Within a month, the besieging forces had grown to 24 Massachusetts regiments supported by contingents of militia from Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire,

Boston, Siege of | 23

in all as many as 16,000 men. Massachusetts general Artemas Ward had initial command. The Patriot siege lines ran from Chelsea around the peninsulas of Charlestown, Boston, and Dorchester Heights to Roxbury. Gage meanwhile evacuated the British troops in Charlestown by water and ordered a defensive line constructed at Roxbury as well as the fortification of four hills in Boston proper, which came to be that city’s chief defensive positions. An informal agreement allowed people to move in and out through Boston Neck, providing no firearms were carried. Perhaps 9,000–10,000 Patriot residents fled the city, while a number of Loyalists moved in the opposite direction, with many of the men joining newly formed Loyalist military units. Because the besiegers had no heavy artillery and the harbor was left open, Vice Admiral Samuel Graves’s Royal Navy ships were able to resupply the Boston garrison from Nova Scotia and other places. Nonetheless, conditions in the city were difficult, and the British troops were placed on short rations. In an operation that would have major implications for the siege, on May 10, hastily organized Patriot forces under Colonels Ethan Allen and Benedict Arnold captured the British bastion of Fort Ticonderoga on the western shore of Lake Champlain and there secured 78 serviceable cannon, including 4- to 24-pounders, 6 mortars, 3 howitzers, thousands of cannonballs, 9 tons of musket balls, and 30,000 flints as well as a large quantity of other military supplies. With Boston running out of fresh meat and in need of hay for the British horses, Gage ordered men to Grape Island, in Boston’s outer harbor, to secure hay. The British were met there by some local residents and Patriot militiamen, who then set fire to

24 | Boston, Siege of

a barn on the island, destroying most of the hay; the British only secured three tons. In response to this incident, Patriot militiamen worked to clear the islands in the harbor of cattle. In the Battle of Chelsea Creek, on May 27–28, Royal Marines attempted to stop the removal of cattle, and the Americans resisted. The British schooner Diana (six guns) grounded and was burned, but not before the Patriot side recovered its ordnance. Congress promptly promoted Israel Putnam, who had led this action, to major general. The British position at Boston was greatly strengthened on May 25 with the arrival of reinforcements under Major Generals John Burgoyne, Henry Clinton, and William Howe, bringing British strength in the city to 6,500 men. The newly arrived generals also brought orders for Gage to impose martial law throughout the rebellious colony of Massachusetts, and the generals pressed Gage to undertake offensive action. Unlike Gage, who believed that the Americans would fight hard and well, many of the British officers and their men did not hold the colonists in high regard as fighters and were eager to teach them a lesson. Following a quick reconnaissance, Clinton strongly urged that the British immediately take Dorchester Heights, which commanded Boston from the south. Gage agreed that this key terrain must be secured, but neither he nor his successor, Howe, did so. On June 12, Gage issued a proclamation in which he demanded an end to the rebellion and that the insurgents turn over their weapons, promising in return a full pardon to all except John Adams and John Hancock, “whose offenses are of too flagrant a nature to admit of any other consideration than that of condign punishment.” The appeal was ignored and actually had the contrary effect.

Meanwhile, on June 14, the Second Continental Congress, which had been meeting in Philadelphia since May, authorized the establishment of 10 rifle companies for the Continental Army (Army of the United Colonies). This was the first regiment, and June 14 is generally regarded as the beginning date for the U.S. Army. The next day, Congress appointed Virginian George Washington as general and commander in chief of the army. Learning that British forces in Boston were preparing to launch attacks on June 18 to occupy some of the high ground that dominated Boston, on June 15, the Massachusetts Committee of Safety ordered Ward to move forces into the Charlestown Peninsula. This was a rash decision, with no military justification. Because the Patriot side lacked heavy guns capable of keeping British ships at bay, any force in the Charlestown Peninsula could easily be cut off by British troops landed behind them at Charlestown Neck. Obedient to his orders, Ward ordered Colonel William Prescott and three regiments of some 1,600 men into the peninsula. On the night of June 16, the Americans occupied and began fortifying Bunker Hill, which was the highest ground and a favorable position as long as the adjacent land and narrow escape route could be held. They also occupied the lower Breed’s Hill, which was closer to Charlestown, to repel the expected British disembarkation. Howe had command of the attacking force, which would make a frontal assault on the colonial positions. Gage rejected Clinton’s sound advice that he be allowed to lead another force to be delivered by the Royal Navy to Charlestown Neck, cutting off the colonials. Gage claimed that it violated sound established military principles to place troops between two hostile forces.



On June 17, the ensuing Battle of Bunker Hill saw the two British assaults beaten back, but the third attempt brought a British victory. It was, however, won at very heavy cost for the attackers. Out of some 2,400 men engaged, Howe’s force suffered 1,054 casualties (including 82 officers), 226 of them dead. Probably only some 1,500 Americans of perhaps 3,200 on the peninsula had actually taken part in the fighting; of these, some 140 were killed, 380 were wounded, and 39 were captured. In terms of percentage of casualties to force engaged, Bunker Hill was one of the most sanguinary battles of the entire century. The battle shook Howe and may well have been a major factor in his subsequent failure as commander in chief to press home attacks in battle. On July 3, 1775, Washington arrived at Cambridge, west of Boston, and assumed command from Ward of the provincial troops there, now numbering some 17,000 men. Washington’s generals estimated that the British then numbered about 11,000– 12,000 men, when British strength was actually some 6,000–7,000 men. Washington’s first priorities were keeping the army fed and supplied and training it. In an effort to impose greater order, he divided it into three wings: the northern wing under Brigadier General Nathanael Greene, the center wing under Brigadier General William Heath, and the right wing under Major General Ward. Washington also ordered an extension of the fortifications surrounding Boston. Fearing that the onset of winter would make it difficult to hold his army together, on September 11, Washington called a council of war and presented a plan for an amphibious assault across Back Bay in flat-bottom boats capable of carrying some 50 men each. The council unanimously opposed the plan,

Boston, Siege of | 25

and it was dropped. But with Continental Army enlistments about to run out, there was growing pressure on Washington to attack, and on October 18, he called another council of war at his Cambridge headquarters. All except Greene opposed an attack as too risky, and Greene supported it only if it could be made with 10,000 men. Washington accepted the council’s decision. On September 26, Gage learned that he had been ordered to return to London. He sailed on October 10. Howe, his second-incommand, received promotion to lieutenant general with the local rank of general and now took command of British forces in the war. Howe believed that effective offensive operations could not be mounted from Boston, and so he wanted to relocate the army elsewhere. William Legge, Lord Dartmouth, who was secretary of state for the colonies and thus charged with running the war, concurred. In a letter dated September 5, which Howe received on November 9, Lord Dartmouth urged Howe to evacuate Boston and proceed to New York City. However, such a step was prevented by a lack of sufficient ships to move the men and their equipment. In early September, Washington had authorized the arming of a number of small vessels for intelligence gathering and to capture isolated British supply ships. On November 29, the lightly armed schooner Lee (6 guns), commanded by Captain John Manley and one of the ships in what is known as “Washington’s Navy,” captured the British brigantine Nancy, which had become separated from the rest of a British convoy in a storm. The Nancy was found to be carrying 2,000 muskets, 31 tons of musket balls, 100,000 musket flints, 3,000 round shot, and a considerable quantity of cartridges as well as a large bronze 13-inch mortar subsequently dubbed “the Congress”

26 | Boston, Siege of

by its captors. It would be by far the most important American acquisition of British arms taken at sea during the war. Winter posed major problems for both sides. Both the Patriots and the British suffered from supply shortages, but the Patriots were more vulnerable to the elements. Their pay was also in arrears, gunpowder was in extremely short supply, and most Continental Army enlistments were due to expire at the end of the year. In November, on Washington’s orders, the chief of the Continental Army artillery, Major General Henry Knox, began the demanding operation of transporting from Fort Ticonderoga via sledges—pulled by oxen overland and across the frozen Hudson and Connecticut Rivers—59 of the artillery pieces captured earlier there from the British. This difficult operation was completed on January 24, 1776. Meanwhile, in midJanuary, acting in accordance with orders from London, Howe had detached some 1,500 men under Clinton for an operation against the southern colonies. Joined by troops sent from Britain, who had been delayed, Clinton eventually made for Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, only to meet rebuff in the Battle of Sullivan’s Island (June 28, 1776). Washington wanted to attack the British, and so on February 16, with the water having frozen between Boston and Roxbury, he again called a council of war and suggested an attack across the ice. Counting militiamen, Washington had some 13,500 men under arms; he estimated British strength at only 5,000. Again, his generals demurred, believing that the British were considerably more numerous (indeed, they then numbered about 8,000 men). Determined to strike, Washington opted for another plan, based on the arrival of the guns from Ticonderoga. Fortunately for the

Americans, Howe had made no effort to take and hold Dorchester Heights, the key high ground that overlooks Boston from the south. Washington planned to take that terrain. Once the Americans were in possession of it, surely Howe would have to attack, an option that Washington welcomed. Washington’s plan called for a surprise American occupation of the heights and completion of defensive fortifications there in only one night. This operation went forward. Because the ground was frozen, the soldiers constructed heavy wooden breastworks that could later be strengthened with earth. Barrels filled with earth would be rolled into place and wooden abatis installed. To conceal his plans, on the night of March 2, Washington ordered a heavy bombardment from Lechmere Point, Cobble Hill, and Roxbury. The cannonade resumed the next night and the next. The British replied, but little damage was done by either side. On the third night, March 4–5, as soon as the firing began, 2,000 American troops with 360 oxcarts of materials occupied Dorchester Heights. As the cannon fire blocked the noise of their activity, 1,200 men labored on the defenses while 800 stood watch. By the morning, Patriot forces were firmly entrenched and, with cannon in place, were in position to bombard the British at will. Boston was now untenable for the British, who were astonished at the completed works and the speed with which it had been accomplished. One Royal Engineer officer wrote that the work must have involved 12,000–15,000 men. Contrary to Washington’s expectations, Howe was not preparing to attack but instead planning to evacuate what was now a smallpox-ravaged city. Washington’s move caused him to change his mind. British artillery opened a two-hour barrage, but



it proved ineffective against the American positions at such heights, killing only 4 men. Howe then gave orders for an attack for that night by 2,200 men, but a British council of war later that day reversed the decision. In a face-saving gesture, Howe blamed the change of orders on a severe late winter storm that struck about midnight, five hours after the attack had been called off. Howe then began loading his nearly 10,000 troops and their equipment, as well as several thousand Loyalists who also desired to depart, aboard 140 ships to sail to Halifax, Nova Scotia. An informal agreement was reached. Washington would not harass the British with artillery fire, and Howe pledged not to destroy the city. On March 17, the winds turned favorable, and the British sailed away. Ward and some men entered Boston on March 17; Washington followed the next day and named Greene military governor. The Americans recovered 69 usable cannon and other valuable stores. Boston was now under permanent American control. The British evacuation of the city marked the end of the first stage of the war. In early April, Washington began transferring resources south to New York City, which he correctly assumed would be the next major British military objective. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Chidsey, Donald Barr. The Siege of Boston: An On-the-Scene Account of the Beginning of the American Revolution. New York: Crown Publishers, 1966. French, Allen. The Siege of Boston. 1911. Reprint, Spartanburg, SC: Reprint Co., 1969. Frothingham, Richard, Jr. History of the Siege of Boston and of the Battles of Lexington,

Boston Massacre | 27 Concord, and Bunker Hill. 1849. Reprint, New York: Da Capo, 1970. McCullough, David. 1776. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2005. Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. Edited by John Richard Alden. New York: Skyhorse, 2011.

Boston Massacre(March 5, 1770) The Boston Massacre was a bloody skirmish between American colonists and British troops on March 5, 1770, in Boston, Massachusetts, that aroused strong American sentiments against the British government. Beginning on October 1, 1768, the British government sent two infantry regiments (the 14th and 29th) into Boston to quell unrest sparked by opposition to the hated Townshend Acts of 1767. The colonists detested the presence of these redcoats, refusing to quarter them and treating them with disdain and hostility, and local radical newspapers reported that the soldiers were causing all manner of trouble, including demanding food, quartering, and other supplies from Bostonians and even fomenting a slave rebellion. Much of this reporting was exaggerated or fabricated, but it nevertheless increased the colonists’ dislike and distrust of the soldiers. The soldiers, meanwhile, were disgruntled with their low pay and poor billeting and were rampantly deserting. Tensions between the armed soldiers and the recalcitrant townspeople, especially laborers who competed with the soldiers for employment in nonmilitary jobs, eventually erupted into violence. On the evening of March 5, 1770, a British sentry in front of the Boston Custom House reacted to taunts from a small group of Bostonians by striking a young wig

28 | Boston Tea Party

maker’s apprentice in the face with the butt of his musket. A crowd formed around the fallen boy, verbally abusing the sentry and threatening him with clubs. The soldier retreated to the steps of the customhouse as the growing mob began to hurl ice, snow, and debris at him. Cries of “fire” and ringing church bells increased the size of the crowd and added to the confusion. As the British officer of the day, Captain Thomas Preston, led an armed relief party to rescue the now terrified sentry, other British officers stopped their men from firing into the growing crowds in front of the Main Guard Barracks. When Preston and his 8 soldiers arrived at the customhouse, the hostile crowd of 300–400 people turned violent. After a club flew through the air and struck a soldier in the head, some of the British troops fired their muskets in retaliation and panic, killing 5 men and wounding others. Preston ordered his men to stop shooting, but the damage had been done. Only the arrival of acting governor Thomas Hutchinson, who promised a full inquiry into the matter, put an end to the melee. The presence of the redcoats in Boston had already infuriated the colonists. Now that the troops had drawn blood, the Boston Massacre became a symbol of British oppression and brutality. Local radical leaders and propagandists, most notably Samuel Adams and Paul Revere, turned the event into a recruiting tool, and the dead became martyrs in the incipient struggle for independence. In the aftermath of the Boston Massacre, some 12,000 colonists marched in the funeral for their fallen comrades. Charged with murder, Preston and his men stood trial two months later. They were defended by John Adams, who argued that they had acted in self-defense. The jury acquitted

Preston and found two of his soldiers only guilty of manslaughter. The soldiers were branded on the thumb and discharged from the army. The overall fairness of the trial— combined with news that Parliament (ironically on the same day the massacre took place) had repealed the Townshend duties, except the one on tea—dissipated the passions aroused by the actual March event and led to a relatively quiet period in Britishcolonial relations, awaiting the next spark that would set them alight. Richard J. Shuster

Further Reading Jensen, Merrill. The Founding of a Nation: A History of the American Revolution, 1763– 1776. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968. Leckie, Robert. George Washington’s War: The Saga of the American Revolution. New York: HarperCollins, 1992. Shy, John. Toward Lexington: The Role of the British Army in the Coming of the American Revolution. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1965. Zobel, Hiller. The Boston Massacre. Norwalk, CT: Easton, 1970.

Boston Tea Party(December 16, 1773) The Boston Tea Party was a nonviolent Patriot act of defiance committed in Boston, Massachusetts, on the night of December 16, 1773, during which 342 containers of British East India Company tea were thrown into Boston Harbor. It was one of the seminal events on the long road to armed confrontation between the North American colonists and the British government. Only 16 months later, on April 19, 1775, building resentments between the colonies and London boiled over into war at



Lexington and Concord, only a short distance from Boston. By the time the Tea Party unfolded, Boston had become a hotbed of political protest. Indeed, some of the more radical leaders of the looming revolution called Boston home, including Samuel Adams and his cousin John Adams. The Boston Tea Party marked the culmination of a series of Patriot protests against British taxation, which traced their origins to the muchreviled March 22, 1765, Stamp Act. The French and Indian War (1754–1763), along with the concomitant Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), had badly depleted the British treasury, resulting in mounting government debt. And although the British had triumphed over the French in North America and had gained control over vast new territories there, London quickly realized that defending and administering these areas would be a very expensive proposition. Thus, to lower Britain’s debt burden and ensure that the North American colonies were adequately governed and protected, Parliament enacted the much-hated Stamp Act. Many North American colonists took umbrage at the legislation, arguing that they had not demanded the annexation of French territory and that Parliament did not have the right to tax the colonies because they were not directly represented in Parliament. This latter complaint would eventually be summed up by the mantra “no taxation without representation.” The Stamp Act was repealed in 1766 but was soon supplanted by the 1767 Townshend Acts. The Townshend Acts imposed a series of import duties on a number of products, including tea, which at the time was the most popular drink among the colonists. This promoted even more vituperative protests in North America, and many colonists were determined not to import or consume

Boston Tea Party | 29

any British products until the duties were repealed. Parliament rescinded the taxes in 1770 but chose to leave in place the tea duty as a symbol of Parliament’s authority over the colonies. Colonists thereafter continued to avoid drinking British-imported tea but freely consumed smuggled tea that was not taxed. In 1770, Lord Frederick North became British prime minister. Unwilling to mollify the North American colonists by rescinding the tea tax, in the early fall of 1773, he permitted the British East India Company, which by then was in a precarious financial position and had accumulated vast surpluses of tea, to ship tea directly into American ports. But North steadfastly refused to repeal the hated tea tax, although the Tea Act substantially reduced the duty. When the colonists learned of this intention, many were prepared to protest the arrival of the tea. British ships carrying tea were forced to turn back before unloading at the ports of New York and Philadelphia, and in Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, the unloaded tea was promptly seized and impounded. In Massachusetts, however, Royal Governor Thomas Hutchinson refused to be cowed by the unruly Patriots in Boston and made certain that the tea was permitted to reach the port at Boston; it was also his intention to have the tea unloaded. By mid-November, a showdown between Boston’s Patriots and Hutchinson became virtually unavoidable. Samuel Adams, one of the leaders of Boston’s anti-British protest movement, was determined not to permit the British tea to be unloaded at Boston. Hutchinson, who despised Adams, planned to have the incoming ships placed under heavy guard to prevent any mishaps. The Dartmouth, the first of three ships carrying the British tea, arrived in Boston on

30 | Brandywine, Battle of

November 28. In less than a week, it was joined by two other merchant ships carrying the remainder of the tea—the Beaver and Eleanor. Together, the ships had in their holds 342 containers of tea totaling nearly 136,000 pounds. The shippers were obliged under law to remit the customs duty on the tea by December 17. As many as 7,000 Boston Patriots, led principally by Adams, hastily convened meetings before the end of November. They demanded that the tea be returned, but Hutchinson refused to issue the order. The Patriots were now determined to not allow the tea to be unloaded, posting their own guards near the three ships on Griffin’s Wharf. Several more Patriot meetings convened, attracting thousands, and on the afternoon of December 16, Adams presided over a gathering at the Old South Meeting House. Once more, with time running out, Adams sent word to Hutchinson, demanding that the ships return to England with their tea. Once again, Hutchinson stood firm. When word of Hutchinson’s defiance reached the meetinghouse, a number of Patriots decided to take matters into their own hands. Only a few hours later, a band of some 60 men stormed the wharf, crudely disguised as Indians, and proceeded to dump the tea into the harbor. Among the perpetrators were members of the Sons of Liberty and the local Committee of Correspondence. Boston’s John Adams rejoiced upon hearing the news of the destroyed tea. News of the event was generally well received throughout the 13 colonies and served to further unite the colonists. Hutchinson, however, was outraged as was Parliament and the North ministry. Determined to penalize the colonists, Parliament enacted the so-called Coercive Acts (March–June 1774), which were particularly harsh toward Massachusetts. Indeed,

the Boston Port Act (March 31) closed the Port of Boston entirely, meaning that no goods, except food for the inhabitants and the British garrison, could be shipped into or out of the port, and the Massachusetts Government Act (May 20) virtually abrogated that colony’s long-standing colonial charter. Of course, these actions only further inflamed Patriot passions and ultimately provoked the American Revolution. Since that fateful night, the Boston Tea Party has served as a powerful symbol of Americans’ dislike toward intrusive government and unfair taxation. In recent years, the so-called Tea Party movement has taken up the mantel of the Boston Tea Party by embracing alleged libertarianism that often veers into virtual anarchism, with its fear and distrust of government and its often quixotic drive to erase the national debt and eliminate many taxes. Paul G. Pierpaoli Jr.

Further Reading Alexander, John K. Samuel Adams: America’s Revolutionary Politician. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002. Carp, Benjamin L. Defiance of the Patriots: The Boston Tea Party and the Making of America. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2010. Labaree, Benjamin Woods. The Boston Tea Party. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1979.

Brandywine, Battle of (September 11, 1777) The Battle of Brandywine (also known as the Battle of Brandywine Creek), the major battle in the British campaign to capture Philadelphia, was fought in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, on September 11, 1777. The British Army commander, General Sir William



Howe, was determined to capture the rebel capital city of Philadelphia. Howe believed that General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, would be forced to defend Philadelphia, and this would be the opportunity for the British to inflict a decisive defeat on the rebel army and then occupy Philadelphia. Surely, Howe reasoned, these results would cause the rebels to give up. On July 23, 1777, Howe sailed from New York with 13,000 troops in some 260 ships. Washington could not be certain of Howe’s destination. It could be South Carolina or even a feint in which Howe would return to New York and move up the Hudson. In early August, however, Washington became convinced that Philadelphia was Howe’s objective and began to move the army in that direction. The arrival of the British fleet in Chesapeake Bay confirmed Washington’s

Brandywine, Battle of | 31

assumption, and he now moved the bulk of his forces south to meet the British. On August 24, Washington’s army of 11,000 men marched through Philadelphia, and the next day, the British began coming ashore at Head of Elk (Elkton, Maryland). On August 26, Washington, Major General Nathanael Greene, and French aristocrat and now Continental Army major general Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, accompanied only by a cavalry guard, set off on a rather foolhardy reconnaissance in unfamiliar territory and watched the British forces come ashore. That night, a sudden storm came up, and the generals spent the night in an empty farmhouse that turned out to belong to a Tory. Fortunately, no one gave the alarm, and the next day, the party returned to the main American lines at Wilmington.

The Battle of Brandywine was the major battle in the British campaign to capture Philadelphia. Fought in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, on September 11, 1777, it saw British forces under General William Howe outflank the Americans under General George Washington. The Americans were, however, able to withdraw in good order. (Library of Congress)

32 | Brandywine, Battle of

Washington had ample time to move forces into defensive positions south of the capital. By September 1, thanks to reinforcements and new recruits, he had in place some 16,000 men between Wilmington and Philadelphia, although some 3,000 of these men were unreliable militia. Washington remained optimistic, regarding the coming battle as an opportunity. He detached small forces to both harass the British and provide information on their movements while at the same time establishing a defensive position with the main army. Skirmishes occurred at Elkton (August 28); Wilmington, Delaware (August 31); and Cooch’s Bridge, Delaware (September 3). Washington was undecided on where to take up his main defensive position. On August 28, he moved Greene’s and Major General Adam Stephen’s divisions to White Clay Creek. Then, following a council of war on September 6, the army relocated to the north side of Red Clay Creek near Newport astride the main road to Philadelphia. Learning that the British had divested themselves of most of their equipment and were preparing to move, Washington ordered his own baggage and tents sent north of Brandywine Creek. Before dawn on the morning of September 8, the British began their advance but not toward Washington’s position. Sending only a detachment toward Red Clay Creek, Howe set most of this army in motion northward toward Philadelphia. Washington believed this to be an effort to outflank his own position, and he hastily withdrew well before dawn on September 9 to Chadd’s Ford on the Brandywine across the more northerly Philadelphia Road. A tributary of the Delaware, creek was an incorrect term for the Brandywine, for it could only be crossed easily at several

widely spaced fords. Greene, who had favored the Chadd’s Ford position earlier, pointed out that it would give the Continentals the high ground and force the British to attack uphill. Pennsylvania officers informed Washington that there were no other fords for a dozen miles north of those covered by his troops. Washington trusted this information, and he neither reconnoitered himself nor sent a trustworthy subordinate to do so. This carelessness nearly proved fatal, for the information was incorrect, and British scouts soon located several undefended fords. Howe’s forces arrived in the vicinity of Chadd’s Ford early on September 10. Assisted by area Loyalists, Howe and his two corps commanders, Lieutenant Generals Lord Charles Cornwallis and Baron Wilhelm von Knyphausen, personally explored the area and were thus far better informed of circumstances than Washington. With a good knowledge of American dispositions, Howe decided to employ the tactics that had worked well for him in the Battle of Long Island (August 27, 1776): a frontal diversion with a wide envelopment as the principal effort. Knyphausen, with a mixed British and Hessian force of 5,000 men, was to make the frontal diversion to fix Washington in place, and Cornwallis was to lead 8,000 British troops in the wide envelopment around the American right in hopes of getting in behind Washington and bagging his entire army. Meanwhile, Washington made his own troop dispositions. He placed Greene’s division, considered his best troops, in the center left of the Patriot line at Chadd’s Ford. With the water there only knee deep, this ford was the logical place for the British to attempt to cross. To Greene’s immediate left, Major General John Armstrong and his Pennsylvania militia covered Pyle’s Ford.



However, steep ground worked against a British crossing there. Major General John Sullivan commanded the American right, with the divisions under Major Generals Stephens and William Alexander, Lord Stirling, stretched out along Brandywine Creek and covering both Brinton’s and Painter’s Fords. A small detachment under Colonel Moses Hazen guarded the far American right at Wister’s Ford, about four miles from Chadd’s Ford. The battle occurred on September 11. That morning, Knyphausen’s men tested the Continental Army defenders at Chadd’s Ford and then withdrew. Greene and the others expected a massive assault by Howe’s entire army, but already at 4:00 a.m., Cornwallis and Howe had set out on a broad arc, with the flanking force about 15 miles from Chadd’s Ford and several miles beyond the extreme American right under Hazen, crossing the Brandywine at unguarded Jeffrie’s Ford. Washington now received conflicting reports. News of the flanking attack almost led him to issue an order for an attack against the badly outnumbered Knyphausen, and Greene rode back from a meeting with Washington to prepare for the assault; however, Washington canceled the order when he received a report that led him to believe that Howe’s movement might be a feint. Washington then refused to proceed until he had confirmation of British dispositions. Early that afternoon, Washington received definitive word that the bulk of the British forces were indeed across the Brandywine and were preparing to roll up the American right. True to form, however, Howe delayed for a time, probably missing the chance to destroy Washington’s army. This delay gave Sullivan time to rotate his force 90 degrees, refusing his flank to meet the British attack, which began at 4:00 p.m.

Brandywine, Battle of | 33

At the same time, Washington ordered Greene to remain in place in the event of a move by Knyphausen supporting Howe. Sullivan’s men, vastly outnumbered by the attacking British, soon gave way. Indeed, most retreated in panic. In these circumstances, Washington decided that he had no choice but to order Greene to march to buttress Sullivan and hold the road to Philadelphia. Defense of the ford would be left to Brigadier General Anthony Wayne, Brigadier General William Maxwell, and Colonel Thomas Proctor’s artillery. Greene immediately swung into action, his men covering four miles under a hot sun in only 45 minutes. His troops included Colonel George Weedon’s steady Virginia regiment and Brigadier General Peter Mühlenberg’s regiment. There was no time to try to reorganize Sullivan’s force; instead, on their arrival, Greene’s men simply fixed bayonets, opened their ranks to let Sullivan’s men pass through, and then closed again to meet the onrushing British. Continental Army major general Henry Knox’s artillery provided effective enfilading fire. Muhlenberg in particular steadied the Americans, riding among them on horseback to encourage them in what became a battle at close quarters with bayonets in which the Americans were outnumbered two to one. Although retrieving the situation was beyond Greene’s means, he and his men were able to hold the British long enough for the arrival of darkness. Slowly, Greene fell back, his men firing in volleys as they withdrew. At the same time, hearing the heavy sounds of the engagement, Knyphausen launched an attack of his own, supported by artillery, against the now weakened American center. It too soon gave way. Nightfall saved the army, permitting Washington and the bulk of his forces to

34 | Bunker Hill, Battle of

make a more or less orderly withdrawal toward Chester. American casualties in the Battle of Brandywine were more than twice those of the British: 200 killed, 700–800 wounded, and almost 400 prisoners. The British suffered 99 killed, 488 wounded, and 6 missing. Although Philadelphia would fall to the British on September 26, Howe had failed to bag Washington’s army, and American morale remained high. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Edgar, Gregory T. The Philadelphia Campaign, 1777–1778. Westminster, MD: Heritage Books, 1966. Martin, David G. The Philadelphia Campaign, June 1777–July 1778. Conshohocken, PA: Combined Books, 1993. McGuire, Thomas J. Brandywine Battlefield Park: Pennsylvania Trail of History Guide. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole, 2001. McGuire, Thomas J. The Philadelphia Campaign. Vol. 1, Brandywine and the Fall of Philadelphia. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole, 2006. Mowday, Bruce. September 11, 1777: Washington’s Defeat at Brandywine Dooms Philadelphia. Shippensburg, PA: White Mane, 2002. Tucker, Spencer C. Rise and Fight Again: The Life of General Nathanael Greene. Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2009. Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. New York: Skyhorse, 2011.

Bunker Hill, Battle of(June 17, 1775) The Battle of Bunker Hill was an important early battle of the American Revolutionary War. Learning that British forces in Boston intended to launch attacks on June 18, 1775,

to occupy Dorchester Heights, Roxbury, Cambridge, and the Charlestown Peninsula, on June 15, 1775, the Massachusetts Committee of Safety ordered forces to move into the Charlestown Peninsula. Colonel William Prescott commanded three regiments of some 1,600 men. The area north of Boston was dominated topographically by Bunker Hill and the lower Breed’s Hill in front of it. On June 16, the American militia occupied Bunker Hill, the highest ground and a favorable position as long as the adjacent narrow land escape route could be held. To repel the expected British disembarkation, they also occupied Breed’s Hill, which was closer to Charlestown, lower, and more vulnerable to a British flanking attack. In reaction to this colonial move, on the morning of June 17, the British sixth-rates Glasgow (24 guns) and Lively (20 guns) and the sloop Falcon (14 guns) shelled the American positions, while the armed transport Symmetry (18 guns) and two gunboats raked Charlestown Neck. Meanwhile, British commander lieutenant general Thomas Gage called a council of war. He and a majority rejected a plan put forth by Major General Henry Clinton for an immediate landing by 500 men south of Charlestown Neck and behind the American redoubts to trap the colonial forces in the peninsula. Gage and the others held that it violated sound military practice to interpose a force between two hostile bodies. The plan adopted called for landing a strong force below Moulton’s Point on the southeast corner of the peninsula and then marching up the east side along the Mystic River. This would outflank the American position and keep the British troops out of range of musket shot. The British could then take the Americans from the rear. The British attack was delayed until high tide in



the early afternoon, however, and in the interval, the Americans extended their lines to cover such a possibility. In preparation for the landing, the British third-rate ship of the line Somerset (68 guns), two floating batteries, and guns at Copp’s Hill in Boston shelled the American redoubt; the Glasgow and Symmetry and two gunboats shelled Charlestown Neck; and the Falcon and Lively swept the ground in front of Breed’s Hill with their guns to clear it for the landing. While this was in progress, 28 British barges crossed to Charlestown Peninsula with some 1,500 troops under Major General William Howe. About 1:00 p.m., they came ashore without opposition at Moulton Point and then formed up in three ranks on Moulton’s Hill as Howe examined the American position. Howe could see that the situation had changed since the early morning, for the American breastworks now extended eastward. There was still an opportunity to flank the American position, but Howe was concerned about the presence of American troops on Bunker Hill. The men there were constructing a covering work, but Howe mistook them to be a reserve. Howe could also see colonial reinforcements marching to Breed’s Hill; these were New Hampshire men under Colonel John Stark (other colonial militia units had refused to cross into Charlestown Peninsula). In all, some 2,500–4,000 colonial militia and six small cannon now opposed the British regulars. Reluctant to interpose his own force between the two bodies of colonial troops on Breed’s Hill and Bunker Hill, Howe rested his men and called up reinforcements. These having arrived, he addressed the men and then ordered an attack on the American breastworks. Although the British ships continued to provide covering fire, Howe’s own artillery was useless, for the

Bunker Hill, Battle of | 35

guns’ ammunition boxes were found to contain solid shot for 12-pounders rather than the 6-pounder guns on hand. He ordered the guns to fire grapeshot, but the distance was too great for it to be effective. Howe still hoped to carry out a flanking attack by smashing the American left while appearing to carry out a frontal assault. It did not work out as planned, for the American left proved too strong. Twice the British were thrown back with heavy losses. It was 90 degrees, and the soldiers were carrying heavy packs, which they did not remove until the third and final assault. The uphill climb also prevented the British from charging with their bayonets during the American reload. The British troops also tended to fire high. On their side, the Americans demonstrated excellent fire discipline, with Brigadier General Israel Putnam ordering, “Don’t fire until you see the whites of their eyes.” Having received some 400 reinforcements, sent after the failure of the first assault, and with the American militia out of powder, the British took Breed’s Hill with bayonets. The militia withdrew to Bunker Hill and then across Charlestown Neck to the mainland, suffering most of their casualties in the retreat. They then began to fortify Winter Hill and Prospect Hill on the road to Cambridge. The British troops did not cross Charlestown Neck. Although the British had won, it was at a very high cost. Of 2,400 men engaged, Howe’s force suffered 1,054 casualties (including 82 officers), 226 of them dead. Probably some 1,500 Americans of perhaps 3,200 on the peninsula had actually taken part in the fighting; of these, some 140 were killed, 380 were wounded, and 39 were captured. In terms of percentage of casualties to force engaged, Bunker Hill was one of the most sanguinary battles of the entire century. The battle shook Howe and may well

36 | Burgoyne, John

have contributed to his subsequent failure as commander in chief to press home attacks against the Americans. Perhaps most important, it demonstrated that relatively inexperi­ enced colonial forces could stand against British regulars in pitched battle. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Brooks, Victor. The Boston Campaign. Conshohocken, PA: Combined Publishing, 1999. Chidsey, Donald Barr. The Siege of Boston. Boston: Crown, 1966. French, Allen. The Siege of Boston. Spartanburg, SC: Reprint Co., 1969. Ketchum, Richard M. Decisive Day: The Battle for Bunker Hill. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1974. Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. Vol. 1. New York: Macmillan, 1952.

Burgoyne, John(1722–1792) John Burgoyne, a British Army officer and dramatist, was born at Park Prospect, London, England, on February 4, 1722. Educated at Westminster School, he was commissioned a subbrigadier in the 3rd Horse Guards on August 9, 1737. Three years later, he was promoted to cornet in the 13th Light Dragoons. He was elevated to lieutenant in the same regiment in 1741. In 1745, Burgoyne purchased a junior captaincy in the 13th Dragoons, but two years later, overwhelmed by gambling debts, he was forced to sell his commission. On June 11, 1756, at the onset of the Seven Years’ War (1754–1763), Burgoyne secured a captaincy in the 11th Dragoons. He fought at Rochefort in September 1757, and in May 1758, he became a lieutenant colonel in the prestigious 2nd (Coldstream)

Guards. In June 1758, he distinguished himself in a British assault on Saint-Malo. In August 1759, Burgoyne was selected by Prime Minister William Pitt to raise a regiment, the 16th Light Dragoons, which became known as “Burgoyne’s Horse.” Promoted to colonel, Burgoyne accompanied an expedition to Belle-Île in February 1761. He was elected to Parliament on March 30, 1761, and in May 1762, he went to Portugal to serve under Count La Lippe with the local rank of brigadier general. On July 27, Burgoyne led a brigade of 3,000 men in a successful attack on Valencia de Alcántara. In late 1762, he was made colonel of the 16th Dragoons, and in March 1763, he became colonel commandant. His regiment was designated “royal” in February 1766 and named the Queen’s Light Dragoons. Burgoyne was promoted to major general on May 15, 1772. In 1774, he wrote a play, Maid of the Oaks, that was staged by David Garrick at Drury Lane Theater. In April 1775, at the beginning of the American Revolutionary War, Burgoyne was ordered with two other major generals, William Howe and Henry Clinton, to North America to assist Lieutenant General Thomas Gage in suppressing American revolutionaries at Boston. Burgoyne spent the summer and fall complaining bitterly about his enforced inactivity and writing a stream of unflattering letters about Gage to various ministers in London. Burgoyne also composed bombastic proclamations and wrote a farce, The Blockade of Boston, that was staged in January 1776. Returning home to London, he lobbied for an independent command, and at the request of Lord George Germain, secretary of state for the colonies, he proposed a strategy for the conduct of the American war. Burgoyne’s idea was that one British army should drive southward from Montreal while another

Burgoyne, John | 37



advanced up the Hudson River. The two would converge at Albany, New York, thus severing New England from the other colonies. On the tactical level, he urged that the British Army employ more light infantry forces and artillery. Instead of being given an independent command, Burgoyne was ordered to lead an army in relief of the Canadian governorgeneral, Lieutenant General Guy Carleton, who was besieged in Quebec. With the local rank of lieutenant general, Burgoyne was appointed second-in-command to Carleton for the upcoming campaign. Burgoyne arrived on June 1, 1776, and spent a frustrating summer and fall serving under Carleton, who after sweeping Lake Champlain clear of a rebel flotilla terminated his campaign in late October without attacking Fort Ticonderoga. Burgoyne returned to England in mid-November and spent the winter criticizing Carleton and lobbying for his strategic plan of the year before. On March 18, 1777, Burgoyne superseded Carleton as commander of the 10,500-man British army in Canada and was ordered to pursue the northern part of his strategy. Returning to Quebec, he launched the Saratoga campaign, proceeding southward in June and quickly seizing Fort Ticonderoga on July 6. He thereupon pushed on toward Albany. Impeded by American forces under Major General Philip Schuyler, Burgoyne did not reach the Hudson River until August 11. Desperate for supplies, he sent a detachment into Vermont that was defeated five days later in the Battle of Bennington, and he did not advance again toward Albany until September 15. At Bemis Heights, on September 19, Burgoyne attacked the entrenched Continental Army forces, now led by Major General Horatio Gates, and was repulsed. Burgoyne attacked again on October 7 with similar

results and was compelled to retreat northward a day later. Quickly surrounded by American forces, he surrendered on October 17 and was allowed to spend the winter on parole at Cambridge, Massachusetts. He returned to England in May 1778 and passed the next two years in Parliament defending his conduct in America. Burgoyne demanded a court-martial to clear himself but was refused this by Prime Minister Lord Frederick North. In 1779, Burgoyne was stripped of his colonelcy in the 16th Light Dragoons, retaining only his rank in the army. A year later, he published an apologia for his surrender at Saratoga, and after North’s government collapsed in 1782, Burgoyne joined the ministry of Charles Watson-Wentworth, 2nd Marquis of Rockingham. Burgoyne was appointed commander in chief of Ireland and colonel of the 4th Regiment and was made an Irish privy councilor, but he was stripped of all his ranks and titles when Rockingham’s government fell a year later. In the mid-1780s, Burgoyne largely abandoned politics and devoted himself to letters. He wrote two comic operas and various other successful plays that were collected and published in 1808. Burgoyne died in London on August 4, 1792. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Bird, Harrison. March to Saratoga: General Burgoyne and the American Campaign, 1777. New York: Oxford University Press, 1965. Hargrove, Richard J. General John Burgoyne. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1983. Nelson, Paul David. General Sir Guy Carleton, Lord Dorchester: Soldier-Statesman of Early British Canada. Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2000. Nelson, Paul David. Horatio Gates: A Biography. Baton Rouge: Louisiana University Press, 1976.

C Camden Campaign (May–September 1780) and Battle (August 16, 1780)

When Gates reached the Southern Army, he found it in deplorable condition and suffering from a severe shortage of rations and supplies. The Delaware and Maryland Continentals, three small artillery companies, and a cavalry corps of 60 men under Colonel Charles Armand were then at Coxe’s Mill. North Carolina militiamen under Major General Richard Caswell, about 1,200 strong, were encamped at Moore’s Ferry, on the Yadkin River, and nearly 1,500 Virginia militiamen were at Deep River. The main cavalry forces under Lieutenant Colonels Anthony White and William Washington were at Halifax, North Carolina, trying to recover after being mauled at Moncks Corner on April 14 and Lenud’s Ferry on May 6. After the fall of Charles Town, British forces quickly took control of South Carolina and Georgia. Clinton dispatched three columns of troops to seize Camden and Ninety Six in upper South Carolina and Augusta in Georgia. On June 5, Clinton departed for New York, leaving Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis in command of the South, with Charles Town as his headquarters. When Gates arrived at Coxe’s Mill, he found awaiting him a report from Brigadier General Thomas Sumter, a South Carolina partisan officer, describing the British dispositions and giving the number of British troops at Camden as 700, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Lord Francis Rawdon. Gates was assured that if American forces could reach Camden within 15 days, Rawdon’s garrison could be overrun. Thus, on

In April 1780, Major General Benjamin Lincoln, commanding 3,371 Continental and militia troops in Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, was besieged by British troops and in danger of defeat. British Army commander lieutenant general Sir Henry Clinton, with 8,500 British, Hessian, and Loyalist soldiers, had maneuvered Lincoln into Charles Town and was fast cutting off the Americans from outside support. Responding to Lincoln’s difficulties, Continental Army commander general George Washington ordered Major General Johann de Kalb to march south with 1,400 Delaware and Maryland Continentals to reinforce the American army in Charles Town. When Kalb arrived in Petersburg, Virginia, on June 6, he learned that Lincoln had surrendered the city and its garrison on May 12. Hence, he reluctantly assumed military command in the Southern Department. Kalb marched into North Carolina and finally encamped at Coxe’s Mill, on Deep River, all the while encouraging Congress to appoint another officer to supersede him in the South. Congress was amenable to Kalb’s request. The congressmen were aware that Washington wanted Major General Nathanael Greene to have the post, but many favored Major General Horatio Gates, who had written them a letter outlining a plan of defense for the South. On June 13, 1780, Gates received the command. 39

40 | Camden Campaign and Battle

July 27, Gates decided, to the astonishment of Colonel Otho Holland Williams and other officers, to march in a direct line toward Camden rather than take a more westward route, where supplies would be plentiful. Gates’s haste was uncharacteristic. A number of factors besides Sumter’s letter contributed to his decision, although that was probably the most weighty one. First, he believed that Rawdon, a young officer, could be easily dealt with. Second, Gates had been stung by criticism of his cautious generalship at Saratoga two year earlier. Third, he learned that Caswell was about to attack opposing forces on Lynches Creek, South Carolina, and was pleading for assistance. Marching westward, Gates left behind the demoralized cavalry units of White and Washington. Gates not only refused to await their reorganization or assist them, but he also pointedly let it be known that he did not consider cavalry to be very useful in the Southern theater. Gates’s poorly supplied and weak troops marched for the next two weeks through a region of pine barrens, sand hills, and swamps peopled by Loyalists. They had only covered 120 miles, often sustained by nothing more than Gates’s promises that plentiful rations were somewhere ahead. The troops suffered terribly, living on green peaches and raw corn, while Gates pleaded with Virginia governor Thomas Jefferson to send food to his half-starved men. Mounted irregulars commanded by Colonel Francis Marion of South Carolina provided Gates with information on British dispositions as he entered that state. Also, Caswell and Brigadier General Griffith Rutherford informed him that Rawdon was moving his troops northward out of Camden and taking a defensive position on Lynches Creek. On August 3, Gates detached a force

under Sumter toward the Wateree River below Camden, with orders to disrupt Rawdon’s supply lines and secure provisions. Despite Gates’s dismissive assessment of Rawdon, the young British officer was a decisive and intelligent soldier. He had under his command three times the number of troops that Sumter had estimated and disposed them to the best advantage. Rawdon recognized the need to concentrate forces near Camden, but he kept small garrisons at Hanging Rock and Rocky Mount to fend off Sumter’s attempts to get around him and attack his supply lines. Sumter attacked Rocky Mount on August 1 and Hanging Rock on August 6 but was repulsed both times. Rawdon next threw Caswell’s North Carolina militia into confusion by feigning an attack at Lynches Creek and then withdrawing. Caswell joined Gates’s army on August 7. Four days later, Rawdon took a defensive post at Little Lynches Creek, 15 miles northeast of Camden, barring Gates’s passage across a bridge. Although outnumbered by the Americans, Rawdon occupied a good defensive post. Nevertheless, he was in danger of being outflanked on his left, thus allowing Gates to seize Camden and throw the British situation in upstate South Carolina into turmoil. Discovering that Rawdon’s position was too strong for a frontal assault, Gates did indeed try a flanking maneuver to the British left, and he may have intended a decisive action. Rawdon hastily fell back to Camden, using Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton’s legion to cover his withdrawal. Rawdon also withdrew his forces from Hanging Rock and Rocky Mount, thus allowing Sumter to seize these positions. Sumter asked Gates for reinforcements to cut off the British line of retreat south of Camden and, on August 14, received 100



Continentals and 300 North Carolina militia under Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Woolford. By then, Gates had reached Rugeley’s Mill, a few miles north of Camden, where he was joined by 800 Virginia militia under Brigadier General Edward Stevens. Gates now believed, inexplicably, that he had collected 7,000 troops. When Colonel Williams gave him the more accurate figure of 3,052, Gates enigmatically remarked that they were “enough for our purpose.” Gates’s purpose was to move quickly into a defensive post just north of Camden and compel the British to either attack at a disadvantage or retreat. Such a plan would repeat his successful conduct against Burgoyne and explain his neglect of cavalry, the absence of his usual caution, and his weakening of the army by detaching reinforcements to Sumter in the face of a British army. It would also explain his decision to march southward on the night of August 15, to the amazement of Tarleton, “in the neighborhood of an enterprising enemy.” Gates did indeed march, almost blindly, even though more than half his army was raw militia and a night maneuver was difficult under the best of circumstances. He had sent Colonel Christian Senff, an engineer, to choose the defensive ground that his army would occupy and wanted to reach that position and construct earthworks before being detected by his opponent. Gates’s officers agreed with his decision. Unknown to Gates, however, Cornwallis had joined the British army at Camden with reinforcements on August 13 and quickly decided that he should not await an American advance. By sheer coincidence, he too decided that he would resort to the unusual recourse of a night march on August 15. His men were mostly regulars or seasoned Loyalists and were disciplined enough to carry out such a difficult

Camden Campaign and Battle | 41

maneuver. His army numbered 122 officers and 2,117 men and consisted of parts of the 23rd, 33rd, and 71st Regiments; the Volunteers of Ireland; Tarleton’s British Legion; two North Carolina Loyalist regiments; a small detachment of Royal Artillery; and a pioneer unit of 26 men. By 10:00 p.m., on August 15, both armies were moving toward each other. Before the march, the Americans were debilitated by the effects of consuming molasses instead of rum, which induced diarrhea. Many of the soldiers, the Virginians in particular, were exhausted and hungry. But Gates was confident that he would be able to rehabilitate his troops once they reached their defensive post. At about midnight, American scouts under Armand and British scouts under Tarleton blundered into each other about halfway between Camden and Rugeley’s Mill. After a sharp clash with Tarleton’s dragoons in the dark, the Americans broke and ran, leaving Gates entirely without cavalry. Tarleton kept his legion of 289 men intact. When Gates was told that Cornwallis was in his front, he was astonished but believed that he had no choice but to fight. At least the ground was favorable for battle, with swamps protecting both his flanks. At daybreak, on August 16, Cornwallis began disposing his line of battle. On his extreme right, he placed the Loyalist light infantry and the troops of the 23rd and 33rd Regiments, all under the command of Lieutenant Colonel James Webster. On Cornwallis’s left, near the road, he put the Volunteers of Ireland and beside them the infantry of the British Legion and the North Carolina volunteers. Rawdon commanded the British left. In the center rear, Cornwallis placed the 71st Regiment as a reserve, and he posted Tarleton’s cavalry on the right behind the fighting line.

42 | Camden Campaign and Battle

As Gates observed the British dispositions, he made a decision that was fatal to his army and his military reputation. Logically, he should have posted his best troops on his left to confront the hardened British regulars of the 23rd and 33rd Regiments and posted his militia on the right to meet Cornwallis’s Loyalist units. Instead, Gates ordered a brigade of Delaware and Maryland Continentals under Kalb to the right wing and posted the Virginia and North Carolina militias in the center and on the left, facing the 23rd and 33rd Regiments. As a reserve, Gates placed the other four Maryland regiments 200 yards behind his line and deployed six cannon in pairs of two along his front. He established his command post 600 yards behind his front and awaited Cornwallis’s first move. After about two hours of skirmishing as the two armies moved into position, Cornwallis opened the battle by ordering his regulars on the right to advance. Williams, observing this maneuver and believing it to be merely an adjustment of the opposing line, rode to Gates’s headquarters and urged the American general to order the Virginia militia under Stevens to advance. Gates agreed and also ordered the Continentals on his right to advance to support the militia and instructed the reserve brigade of Marylanders to occupy the position soon to be vacated by the advancing militia, thus giving his only order of the entire battle. The order for the militia to attack was a blunder, for both Gates and Williams were sadly deluded into believing that raw militiamen could charge regulars with good effect. As the Virginians advanced, they found before them not a disorganized body of troops readjusting their battle line but rather troops charging in their direction, firing and yelling as they came. The

Virginians, stricken with panic, immediately threw down their loaded muskets and fled in terror, sweeping most of the North Carolinians with them. At that point, Cornwallis ordered Rawdon to send the rest of his line into action against Kalb’s Maryland and Delaware regulars. Gates was appalled that one whole wing of his line had disintegrated. Riding into the midst of the retreating militiamen, he strove with Caswell’s assistance to rally his men. Caught up in the throng of fleeing militiamen, Gates withdrew from the battlefield and attempted twice more to stop the panicstricken citizen soldiers. Gates now believed, as he later told Congress, that the Maryland and Delaware Continentals had also been overrun and that he had no choice but to ride to Charlotte, 60 miles distant, and there attempt a reorganization of his army. With Tarleton’s cavalry bedeviling him, he rode in great haste for this destination and finally retreated all the way to Hillsborough. Despite Gates’s belief that the Continentals had been destroyed, they were in fact fighting the entire British force with desperate courage and determination. The Maryland reserves under the command of Brigadier General William Smallwood attempted to shore up the American left after the militia’s departure. Cornwallis turned Webster’s regulars against the Marylanders, and a bitter fight ensued. Twice the Continentals were forced back, and twice they rallied. Cornwallis committed one battalion of the 71st Regiment to his right and the other to his left, but even with this reinforcement, the Continentals held. Finally, noticing a gap between the two Continental brigades, Cornwallis ordered the legion cavalry to charge through. The American line broke, although some Continentals rallied briefly before finally being

Canada Expedition | 43



driven from the field. Williams, rather than accompanying them, joined other Americans in hand-to-hand combat that was still going on to his right. Kalb, unhorsed and wounded, refused to surrender without orders from Gates. Kalb rallied his men and led a counterattack but fell mortally wounded before Tarleton returned from his pursuit of the militia and struck the Americans from the rear. At that point, organized Patriot resistance ceased, as the soldiers fled for their lives. A few Americans rallied under Armand at Rugeley’s Mill and tried to protect the baggage train from Tarleton’s legion. Most, however, were pursued by Loyalist troopers—against whom they could offer no opposition—all the way to Hanging Rock before the British horsemen stopped from exhaustion. Tarleton then rallied his legion, and on August 18, at Fishing Creek, he routed Sumter’s militiamen in a humiliating defeat. Gates’s defeat at Camden was far worse. He had lost more than 1,000 men—about 250 men killed and 800 wounded—and his Southern Army had ceased to exist. Cornwallis suffered 68 killed and 256 wounded. The road now seemed open for the British to march northward without hindrance. But Cornwallis had his own problems: sickness among his men, the summer heat, and partisan operations against his supply lines. With the assistance of Marion and Sumter, Gates was given time to recoup his losses while Cornwallis remained in camp at Waxhaw Creek. Gates’s military reputation was ruined. Ridiculed for leaving his army engaged on the battlefield and riding 180 miles in three days to Hillsborough, North Carolina, he was relieved of command by Congress on October 5. This time, Congress let Washington make the selection, and he indeed

chose Greene, who assumed command of the Southern Army on December 2. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Landers, H. L. The Battle of Camden, South Carolina, August 16, 1780. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1929. Lumpkin, Henry. From Savannah to Yorktown: The American Revolution in the South. New York: Paragon, 1981. Morrill, Dan L. Southern Campaigns of the American Revolution. Baltimore: Nautical and Aviation Publishing, 1993. Nelson, Paul David. General Horatio Gates: A Biography. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1976. Nelson, Paul David. “Major General Horatio Gates as a Military Leader: The Southern Experience.” In The Revolutionary War in the South: Power, Conflict, and Leadership, edited by W. Robert Higgins, 132– 158. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1979. Pancake, John S. This Destructive War: The British Campaign for the Carolinas, 1780– 1782. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1985. Piecuch, Jim. The Battle of Camden: A Documentary History. Charleston, SC: History Press, 2006.

Canada Expedition (August 1775–July 1776) On June 1, 1775, the Continental Congress decided to dispatch American expeditionary forces to Canada in an effort to capture both Montreal and Quebec. The Americans hoped to thereby add Canada to the revolutionary cause but also seal the backdoor to America for the British up the St. Lawrence River.

44 | Canada Expedition

The Montreal expedition began first. On August 28, 1,200 men departed Fort Ticonderoga up Lake Champlain in an array of watercraft to capture St. Johns on the Richelieu River. Major General Philip Schuyler had command. St. Johns was held by only 200 British regulars with several cannon, and Schuyler soon increased his strength to some 1,700 men, more than twice the number of British regulars in all of Canada. He also had five cannon and three mortars, but he was duped regarding British strength; his initial assault went awry. Schuyler, who was ill, then handed over command to Brigadier General Richard Montgomery. Reinforcements and the news that Indians loyal to the British had departed revived American morale. Montgomery now had 2,000 men, and while the British had strengthened St. Johns, its garrison still numbered only 500 men. Instituting a siege, Montgomery cut communications with Montreal. Meanwhile, on September 25, Colonels Ethan Allen and John Brown, with several hundred men, attempted to take weakly held Montreal; however, Brown’s force failed to get into the action, and Allen and most of his men were taken prisoner. On October 18, Montgomery captured Chambly near St. Johns, which had been held by 89 British soldiers. The Americans also secured 6 tons of powder, 3 mortars, 150 muskets, 6,500 cartridges, 500 hand grenades, 300 swivel-shot, and 158 barrels of provisions. This action also severed the water route connecting St. Johns with Montreal. On October 30, Montgomery turned back a British and Indian force of some 800 men under the British governor of Quebec, Major General Sir Guy Carleton, attempting to raise the siege, and on November 2, St. Johns surrendered. The

Americans took 500 prisoners as well as 41 cannon. Montgomery could now proceed against Montreal, but the prolonged siege had forced him into a winter campaign. On November 13, Montgomery secured the surrender of Montreal. Carleton and some 150 British regulars were able to load valuable stores aboard ships and sail for Quebec, but American cannon at Sorel turned the ships back. The Americans bluffed the British into surrendering the brigantine Gaspee, two other armed ships, eight smaller boats, and the stores. All British personnel were taken prisoner except for Carleton and several of his officers, who escaped shortly before the surrender. On September 13, meanwhile, the second American expeditionary force, bound for Quebec, got under way when Colonel Benedict Arnold marched 1,051 men from Cambridge to Newburyport, Massachusetts. Five days later, they sailed in a small flotilla for the Kennebec River, planning to proceed through the Maine wilderness to the St. Lawrence and then cross to Quebec. Proceeding up the Kennebec, Arnold’s men reached Gardinerstown on September 22, where 200 bateaux were waiting for them. Few of his men had any experience in these craft, which in any case were too heavy and too poorly built to operate all the way to the St. Lawrence. By September 24, Arnold had reached Fort Western (now Augusta, Maine). Arnold expected the trip to the St. Lawrence to take 20 days, but the expedition was in trouble as soon as it departed the last Maine outpost. Traversing the rapids proved difficult, especially at Norridgewock Falls, which was reached on October 7. The bateaux scraped the rocks, opening seams, soaking gunpowder, and ruining supplies. Much of the passage was through boggy



terrain that was made more difficult by cold weather and heavy rains. Short on supplies, Arnold’s men were soon starving. On October 25, Arnold lost nearly a third of his force when 300 men under Colonel Roger Enos voted to return home. Finally, on November 9, following what was a remarkable trek of some 400 miles through the wilderness, Arnold reached Point Lévis, opposite Quebec, with 675 men. However, a shortage of boats and a winter storm delayed his crossing until the night of November 13. The next day, they were on the Plains of Abraham before Quebec. On November 15, Arnold unsuccessfully attempted to bluff Lieutenant Colonel Allan MacLean and his 1,200-man garrison into surrender. Arnold believed that it would require 2,000 men and cannon to take Quebec. Learning that MacLean was planning a sortie against him, Arnold withdrew to Pointeaux-Trembles to await the arrival of Montgomery from Montreal. Meanwhile, Carleton reached Quebec and assumed command there. Montgomery arrived on December 2 along with 600 men, some artillery, the captured British supplies, and winter clothing. Together, he and Arnold had 1,250 men to face an equal number of Canadian defenders, who were in a fortified city with cannon. On December 5, Continental Army forces were again on the Plains of Abraham, and they initiated a loose siege of Quebec. Believing his militia to be unreliable, Carleton refused to engage the Americans outside the city. Montgomery and Arnold lacked the means to maintain a complete siege, nor could they remain there indefinitely, for they had limited supplies and Arnold’s enlistments were about to expire with no

Canada Expedition | 45

hope of renewal. Arnold and Montgomery therefore decided to stake all on an attack on December 31 with their approach masked by a blizzard. It was a two-pronged American attack. Montgomery led 500 men in a southerly approach, arriving at Près de Ville by 4:00 a.m. Personally leading his men from the front against a fortified position, Montgomery and several dozen of his men were killed by fire from two British 3-pounder cannon. Montgomery’s successor, Colonel Donald Campbell, then ordered a retreat. Meanwhile, Arnold approached the city from the north. Arriving at Saint Roch with 700 men, he enjoyed more success, but in the ensuing fighting, he was wounded in the knee and had to be evacuated. Major Daniel Morgan succeeded to the command and was able to penetrate the city. With Montgomery’s southern force having withdrawn, Carleton was able to concentrate against the northern threat and prevent further advance. The Americans were surrounded, cut into small detachments, and, by 9:00 a.m., forced to surrender. In the Battle of Quebec, the Americans suffered 30 killed, 42 wounded, and 425 taken prisoner. British and Canadian militia forces had only 5 dead and 13 wounded. Arnold collected the survivors and reestablished a loose siege of the city, retaining a tenuous hold outside Quebec during the winter. On May 6, 1776, however, the British supply ship Surprise arrived, effectively ending the siege, and shortly thereafter, Carleton drove off Arnold’s force. On June 1, substantial Anglo-German reinforcements reached Quebec by sea via the St. Lawrence under British major general John Burgoyne and Brunswick major general Friedrich Adolf Riedesel Freiherr zu Eisenbach. Too late, the Americans were reinforced in

46 | Carleton, Sir Guy

Canada by six regiments under Brigadier General John Sullivan, but smallpox ravaged his force. Believing that it was held by only 300 men, on June 6, 1776, Sullivan sent Brigadier General William Thompson and 2,000 men against Trois-Rivières, halfway between Quebec and Montreal. In the ensuing battle, on June 8, the Americans were defeated, losing 40 dead, 30 wounded, and 236 captured. British losses were 8 dead and 9 wounded. Carleton’s caution allowed Sullivan’s battered force to escape to Montreal. Sullivan hoped to hold Île aux Noix, the last American post in Canada, but this proved impossible. Desperately short of supplies and with much of his army sick and now opposed by 8,000 British regulars and Hessian mercenaries, Sullivan returned to Crown Point at the end of July with what little remained of his force. The Canadian campaign was a complete failure. The error lay not in attempting it but rather in insufficiently supporting it. Had the campaign succeeded, it would no doubt have united Canada to the other British North American colonies and changed the entire course of the war. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Gabriel, Michael P. Major General Richard Montgomery: The Making of an American Hero. Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2002. Lanctot, Gustave. Canada and the American Revolution, 1774–1783. Translated by Margaret M. Cameron. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1967. Morrissey, Brendan. Quebec 1775: The American Invasion of Canada. Translated by Adam Hook. Oxford, UK: Osprey, 2003. Stanley, George. Canada Invaded, 1775–1776. Toronto: Hakkert, 1973.

Carleton, Sir Guy(1724–1808) British Army officer and colonial administrator Guy Carleton, a member of an old Anglo-Irish family, was born on September 23, 1724, in County Tyrone, Ireland. He joined the British Army on May 21, 1742, enrolling as an ensign in the 25th Regiment. On May 1, 1745, he was promoted to lieutenant. He was aide-de-camp to the Duke of Cumberland in 1747 and fought in the Netherlands during the War of the Austrian Succession (1740–1748). On July 22, 1751, Carleton entered the 1st Foot Guards with the army rank of lieutenant. Upon the recommendation of his friend Lieutenant Colonel James Wolfe, Carleton became a military adviser to Charles Lennox, 3rd Duke of Richmond, in early 1753. With the duke’s patronage, Carleton assumed the lieutenant colonelcy of the 1st Foot Guards on June 18, 1757. In 1758, during the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), Carleton was aide-de-camp to Prince Ferdinand during operations in Germany and was appointed lieutenant colonel of the 72nd Regiment. When Wolfe organized his campaign against Quebec in early 1759, he commissioned Carleton as quartermaster general of the army, with the rank of colonel in America. Carleton was wounded at Quebec on September 4. Returning to Britain, he served as a brigadier general in the expedition to Belle-Île off the French coast in March 1761 and was again wounded. He was promoted to colonel on February 19, 1762, and joined the Earl of Albemarle’s expedition against Havana, Cuba, as quartermaster general with the local rank of brigadier general. On July 22, he was wounded for the third time. On April 7, 1766, Carleton was appointed lieutenant governor of Quebec. Sailing into New York on August 21, 1766, he consulted



with General Thomas Gage, commander in chief of British forces in North America, and finally arrived at Quebec on September 22. On October 3, Carleton was appointed brigadier general in America. He quickly asserted control over the governing council, and although some thought his actions arbitrary, his superiors in London supported him. He encouraged the fur trade and unsuccessfully battled against the fee system used to pay government officials. As a military man, he attempted to improve Quebec’s defenses. When Parliament began discussing the reorganization of Quebec’s government in 1767, Carleton supported the French Canadians’ cultural heritage and encouraged laws to protect it. In 1770, he took a leave of absence and returned to Britain to present his views. He was promoted to colonel of the 47th Regiment on April 12, 1772. In 1774, Parliament approved the Quebec Act, incorporating most of Carleton’s recommendations. Carleton returned to Quebec on September 18, 1774. In the summer and fall of 1775, American rebels from the lower 13 colonies invaded Quebec. Carleton tried to mobilize the old French citizens, but they were hesitant to help, and he would not use Indians, whose methods he found distasteful. Meanwhile, Continental Army brigadier general Richard Montgomery advanced up Lake Champlain toward Montreal, while Colonel Benedict Arnold approached Quebec through Maine. Carleton attempted to defend Montreal but was forced to flee to Quebec, with Montgomery in pursuit. Carleton arrived at Quebec just before Arnold invested the city. On December 31, 1775, Carleton defeated an American attempt to capture Quebec in which Montgomery was killed and Arnold was wounded. A loose American siege of Quebec was relieved on

Carleton, Sir Guy | 47

May 6, 1776, by the arrival of reinforcements from Britain, and Carleton learned that on January 1 he had been promoted to full general in America. By June 19, 1776, Carleton had pushed the rebels, who were severely weakened by smallpox, completely out of Canada. During that summer, he organized a fleet on Lake Champlain to invade upstate New York. On July 6, he was given a knighthood. He attacked and destroyed an American flotilla commanded by Arnold at Valcour Island on October 11–12 and then approached Fort Ticonderoga. Deciding that the fort was too strong to assault and that the season was too late to continue the campaign, Carleton withdrew his army into Canada. When Lord George Germain, the British colonial secretary, learned of Carleton’s decision not to attack Fort Ticonderoga, he was dismayed and appointed Lieutenant General John Burgoyne to replace Carleton as army commander in Canada during the next year’s campaign. Before Germain’s decision, on August 29, Carleton had been promoted to lieutenant general in the British Army. When Carleton learned in the spring of 1777 that Burgoyne was replacing him as army commander, he resigned his governorship and asked to be called home. While awaiting his new orders, he supported Burgoyne during the summer. When Burgoyne was defeated at Saratoga in October, Carleton was not blamed in London. He returned to Britain in July 1778, where he lived quietly, keeping up his political connections and waiting for a new assignment. On February 18, 1782, Carleton was appointed to succeed Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton as commander in chief in America and was dispatched to New York, where he arrived on May 5. Still hoping to persuade the Americans to remain within

48 | Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, British Siege of

the British Empire, he was dismayed to learn in August that Britain had agreed to American independence. Although he asked to be relieved on August 14, he was persuaded to remain and supervise the withdrawal of British troops and Loyalists. Over the next few months, despite enormous logistical difficulties, he dispatched 30,000 soldiers and 27,000 refugees from America. Carleton himself sailed from New York on December 5, 1783. He was welcomed in London, and his advice was solicited about the reorganization of Canada to accommodate the large influx of Loyalists. In 1784, Carleton was appointed governor of Quebec, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick. On April 21, 1786, he was created 1st Baron Dorchester, in recognition of his military contributions. Carleton returned to Quebec on October 23, 1786, and continued to advocate the interests of the French inhabitants. At the same time, he sympathized with the new Loyalist community. Because numerous language and cultural differences separated these groups, Parliament, with Carleton’s approval, divided the region into Upper Canada, largely English speaking, and Lower Canada, mostly old Quebec, in 1791. Carleton returned to Britain in 1791, and on October 12, 1793, he was promoted to full general. Back in Quebec by October 1793, Carleton successfully dealt with problems caused by the French Revolution and less so with military and diplomatic tensions between the United States and Britain. In 1794, he adopted a tone of belligerence toward America that seemed to threaten war and was mildly rebuked by Henry Dundas, the home secretary. Angrily, Carleton requested permission to resign, and in May 1796, he was replaced. He and his family were shipwrecked on their way home and

had to be rescued. In Carleton’s last years, he lived as a landed gentleman, keeping up his interest in military affairs. In March 1801, he transferred to the colonelcy of the 27th Light Dragoons and in August 1803 to the 4th Dragoons. Carleton died in Maidenhead, Berkshire, on November 10, 1808. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Bowler, R. Arthur. “Sir Guy Carleton and the Canadian Campaign of 1776 in Canada.” Canadian Historical Review 55 (1974): 131–140. Nelson, Paul David. General Sir Guy Carleton, Lord Dorchester: Soldier-Statesman of Early British Canada. Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2000. Smith, Paul H. “Sir Guy Carleton: SoldierStatesman.” In George Washington’s Opponents: British Generals and Admirals in the American Revolution, edited by George A. Billias, 103–141. New York: Morrow, 1969.

Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, British Siege of (March 29–May 12, 1780) As a major American seaport city, Charles Town (present-day Charleston), South Carolina, had attracted British attention early in the American Revolutionary War. In June 1776, British major general Henry Clinton had tried to take the city, but British naval forces were driven off in the Battle of Sullivan’s Island (June 28, 1776). Three years later, in May 1779, Major General Augustine Prévost mounted a raid on Charles Town in an effort to draw off American forces under Major General Benjamin Lincoln, the Continental Army commander in the South, from an attack on



Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, British Siege of | 49

Augusta, Georgia, but Prévost had been forced to withdraw. This time Clinton, now a lieutenant general and commander of British forces in North America, was determined to succeed. Georgia was already in British hands, and, indeed, in October 1779, the British had beaten back a joint American and British effort to retake Savannah, Georgia. Securing Charles Town would give the British a secure base for the reconquest of the two Carolinas before moving northward against Virginia. Clinton anticipated taking areas and then training and arming Loyalist militias, who would hold them for the Crown. On October 11, 1779, Clinton ordered the abandonment of Newport, Rhode Island. Its 3,000-man British garrison departed on October 15. Aware of the threat to Charles Town and its vulnerability, on November 20, a small American naval squadron was ordered there to help protect against a British seaborne assault. Commanded by Commodore Abraham Whipple, it consisted of the frigates Boston (24 guns), Providence (28 guns), and Queen of France (28 guns) along with the sloop Ranger (18 guns). On December 26, leaving German lieutenant general Baron Wilhelm von Knyphausen in command in the North, Clinton sailed from New York with 8,500 men in 90 transports, convoyed by 5 ships of the line and 9 frigates. Vice Admiral Marriot Arbuthnot had command of the naval operation in what was the largest British expeditionary force of the war after that of General Sir William Howe against Philadelphia in 1777. The British ships reassembled off Tybee Island, at the mouth of the Savannah River, for a brief rest and refit, then sailed north for Charles Town on February 10, 1780. The next day, February 11, British troops came ashore on Johns Island, 30 miles south

of the city. Counting British forces already in the area, Clinton now commanded some 14,500 men and enjoyed significant naval support from Arbuthnot’s squadron. South Carolina governor John Rutledge employed 600 slaves to dig earthworks to protect the city. Among these defensive works was one named the Citadel, later the site of South Carolina’s military college of the same name. On March 29, Clinton crossed the Ashley River with 7,000 men and commenced the siege of Charles Town. Lincoln agreed to an appeal from the city leaders that he defend the city, and virtually the entire American army in the South would soon be bottled up there. Meanwhile, the besiegers made good progress, and by April 1, they had advanced their trenches to within 800 yards of the American defenses. On April 6, however, Brigadier General William Woodford managed to slip past the besiegers to reinforce Charles Town with 750 Virginia Continental Army troops. On April 8, Admiral Arbuthnot managed to run a number of his ships past the heavy guns of American Fort Moultrie, located on Sullivan’s Island and guarding the mouth of Charles Town Harbor. These were the fourth-rate Renown (50 guns); the fifthrates Roebuck (44 guns) and Romulus (44 guns); the frigates Richmond (32 guns), Blonde (32 guns), Virginia (28 guns), and Raleigh (32 guns); the armed ship Sandwich (24 guns); and several smaller ships. The operation claimed 27 British casualties and the Arteus, an ordnance ship that grounded and was burned. There were no American casualties in the fort, which was commanded by brevet Brigadier General Charles C. Pinckney. Having thus effected a major breach in the American defenses, the British ships anchored off Fort Johnson. Meanwhile,

50 | Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, British Siege of

Lincoln rejected an escape from Charles Town by crossing Biggin Bridge over the Cooper River. With the British forces ashore having now completed their first series of parallel trenches, Clinton called on Lincoln to surrender, but the American general refused. On April 13, British siege guns and the ships in the harbor commenced what would be a monthlong bombardment. A viable escape route for the Americans remained open across the Cooper River to Moncks Corner, 30 miles distant. On April 12, to guard the upper reaches of the Cooper River, Lincoln dispatched Brigadier General Isaac Huger and his cavalry of some 500 men to Biggin Bridge, near Moncks Corner, to guard a large quantity of supplies intended for American forces at Charles Town. Clinton responded to this move by sending Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton and his British Legion and Major Patrick Ferguson’s Loyalist troops, altogether some 1,400 men, to attack Huger and take possession of Moncks Corner and the nearby bridge over Biggin Creek, where Huger was stationed. On April 13, they were joined by Lieutenant Colonel James Webster and the 33rd and 64th Infantry regiments. The British plan called for Tarleton and Ferguson to proceed ahead quickly and silently to Moncks Corner and take Huger by surprise at night. En route, the British captured a messenger carrying a letter from Huger to Lincoln that described the deployment of his men. Arriving at Moncks Corner around 3:00 a.m. on April 14, the British caught the Americans completely by surprise. Not only were there no patrols, but Huger had positioned his cavalry in front of his infantry. With swamps on either side of the causeway preventing a flanking attack, Tarleton led an immediate cavalry charge against the

Americans. In the ensuing Battle of Biggin Bridge (or Biggin Church), the British easily dispersed the Patriots defending Biggin Bridge. The Americans suffered 14 dead, 13 wounded, and 67 captured; British losses were only 3 wounded. Although most of the Americans were able to escape, including Huger and cavalry commander lieutenant colonel William Washington, the British captured 42 wagonloads of supplies as well as 200 cavalry mounts. The latter were of significant value to the British, who had lost many of their horses during the voyage to the south. The British victory at Moncks Corner cut off Lincoln’s access to the interior of South Carolina and hastened the surrender of Charles Town. On April 18, British colonel Lord Francis Rawdon arrived at Charles Town with reinforcements. British strength there was now some 10,000 men. A day later, British forces were within 250 yards of Charles Town Neck. Lincoln, convinced that the situation was hopeless, convened a council of war. The officers were in favor of evacuation, but South Carolina lieutenant governor Christopher Gadsden was strongly opposed; therefore, the matter was deferred until the next day. At that meeting, Gadsden brought with him the rest of the members of the governor’s council, and all expressed their opposition to a withdrawal from the city. One even said that if the army attempted to do so, the townspeople would burn their boats and assist the British. The members of the council carried the day. On April 21, with the British siege lines having been advanced to within only 200 yards from those of the Americans, Lincoln took matters into his own hands and proposed to Clinton a surrender with the honors of war. This would have allowed the American soldiers to withdraw from the city unmolested, with their weapons and



baggage, and the American warships to proceed to sea. Clinton rejected this, and the fighting continued. On May 6, 1780, Lieutenant Colonel Tarleton and 150 troopers of his British Legion surprised and routed some 350 Continental cavalrymen under Lieutenant Colonels William Washington and Anthony White at Lenud’s Ferry, near present-day Jamestown, South Carolina. The Americans suffered 40 killed or wounded and 65 taken prisoner. The British also freed 18 of their soldiers who had been taken prisoner at Awendaw Creek by the Americans the day before. On May 7, 1780, Lieutenant Colonel William Scott surrendered Fort Moultrie. Captain Charles Hudson of the British frigate Richmond had threatened to storm the fort with 500 Royal Marines. Most of Moultrie’s garrison had been evacuated earlier, but the British still took 217 prisoners and captured 41 guns and 4 large mortars as well as considerable quantities of artillery ammunition and equipment. On May 11, with their artillery now advanced close to Charles Town, the British opened fire directly into the city itself. The city leaders then called on Lincoln to capitulate, and he did so the next day, May 12. The siege claimed 89 Americans killed and 138 wounded. British losses were 76 killed and 189 wounded. At Charles Town, the British captured 5,466 officers and men (including 7 generals), some 400 cannon, and 6,000 muskets. They also secured the Continental Navy frigates Boston and Providence and the sloop Ranger. The Queen of France was sunk to prevent its capture. Clinton paroled the militiamen, who were thus allowed to return home, but the Continental Army soldiers passed into British captivity. The British capture of Charles Town was the largest single defeat for American arms of the entire war and the greatest defeat for

Cherry Valley Massacre, New York | 51

an American army before the fall of Bataan in the Philippines in 1942. Believing that the campaign in the South was now pretty much won, Clinton left behind his secondin-command, Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis, and 8,500 men to continue mopping up operations. On June 8, he set out with the remainder of the British troops to New York, where he arrived on June 17. Meanwhile, on May 18, Cornwallis set out with 2,500 men to pacify the remainder of South Carolina. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Borick, Carl P. A Gallant Defense: The Siege of Charleston, 1780. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2003. Chartrand, Rene. The French Army in the American War of Independence. London: Osprey, 1992. Kaufmann, J. E. Fortress America. Cambridge, MA: Da Capo, 2004. Mattern, David B. Benjamin Lincoln and the American Revolution. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press. 1998.

Cherry Valley Massacre, New York(November 11, 1778) On November 11, 1778, a mixed force of Native Americans, Loyalists, and British regulars attacked the Patriot settlement of Cherry Valley in Oswego County, in northcentral New York state. Cherry Valley was first settled by Europeans in 1740 and was named for the numerous cherry trees in the area. During the French and Indian War (1754–1763), the settlers maintained friendly relations with the nearby Mohawk tribe and thereby escaped most of the fighting. Joseph Brant, a leading Mohawk war chief during the American Revolutionary

52 | Cherry Valley Massacre, New York

War, grew up nearby and knew the area and its settlers well. Most of the approximately 300 people in the settlement at the beginning of the American Revolutionary War supported the revolutionary cause. They and the few Loyalists managed to live together in relative harmony. Captain Robert McKean raised a company to defend the area from possible British attack, but McKean and his men were called away. The settlers then petitioned the state government at Albany to send troops. A militia company arrived and soon had fortified the home of Colonel Samuel Campbell, raising a stockade there. Many of the inhabitants moved their possessions to the stockade, and some took to sleeping there for protection from possible raiding parties. While the residents of Cherry Valley largely escaped the early fighting, 1778 was different, for in that year the British supported Native American raids into western New York and northeastern Pennsylvania. Colonel John Butler struck the Patriot settlement in the Wyoming Valley on July 3, and Brant destroyed Andersontown in late July and attacked German Flatts in September. Patriot forces retaliated by destroying Brant’s base at Unadilla on October 8 and attacking several Native American villages. These attacks gave the residents of Cherry Valley a false sense of security and also provided the Native Americans with a reason to strike back. Captain Walter Butler, son of Colonel John Butler, had been taken prisoner during Brigadier General Barry St. Leger’s Fort Stanwix campaign (August 2–August 23, 1777). Held in Albany for nearly a year under sentence of death, Captain Butler had been freed by Loyalists but held a hatred of Patriots. He also wanted to prove himself as

a leader along the lines of his father. In late October 1778, Butler assembled at presentday Windsor, New York, a force of just under 600 men. They included some 320 Seneca, regarded as the most violent and least disciplined of the Iroquois, as well as 150 Loyalist Rangers, 50 members of the 8th Regiment of Foot, and other white volunteers. On October 29, Butler set his men in motion toward Cherry Valley. They were then joined by Brant and his Mohawk. At first opposed to attacking his boyhood home, Brant had been persuaded to go along. With the Mohawk, Butler now had slightly more than 700 men. Continental Army major general MarieJoseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, had earlier visited Cherry Valley while planning a new American invasion of Canada (which never occurred). Determining its defenses to be weak, he had ordered construction of a new fort. To assist with this, Colonel Ichabod Alden and 250 men of his 7th Massachusetts Regiment had arrived at the beginning of August. Unfortunately for the Cherry Valley residents, capable colonel Peter Gansevoort, the hero of the Siege of Fort Stanwix who had requested the assignment, had been turned down, and the incompetent Alden was dispatched instead. Seeing no danger to the settlement, Alden immediately ordered all civilians and their possessions removed from a stockade that militiamen had recently erected around the church, meetinghouse, and graveyard and from the earlier stockade. Warned on November 8 by a friendly Oneida Indian that Butler and Brant were headed toward Cherry Valley, Alden dismissed the report as false and continued to bar the residents and their possessions from the fort. He nonetheless sent out a scouting



party of nine men, which was easily captured by Brant on the night of November 10. The sergeant commanding it was a former Loyalist, and from him Brant learned everything he would need to know for an attack on the settlement that night. However, rain and snow delayed the attack until morning. The attackers struck at 10:00 a.m. on November 11, 1778, although it rained throughout the attack. Alden was caught early while running from his headquarters toward the fort. He was killed and scalped, possibly by Brant himself. After taking everything of value, the attackers destroyed the village but were unable to take the fort. Forty-seven people were killed and scalped, including 32 women and children, and 30 others were taken prisoner. Most of the bloodshed was caused by the Seneca, who ran amok through the village. Brant and his Mohawk actually intervened with the Seneca to save some inhabitants whom Brant knew. Butler, a weak leader who did not understand whom he was dealing with in the Seneca, subsequently regretted his inability to control them and vowed never again to lead such a raid. A messenger alerted other garrisons in the area, and soon help was on the way to Cherry Valley; however, Butler and his men easily escaped the next day with their prisoners to return to Fort Niagara. The attack was remembered by the Patriot side as the Cherry Valley Massacre. In the long run, it was very costly to Native Americans, for the next year, Continental Army commander general George Washington ordered a sizable Continental Army operation under Major General John Sullivan to destroy the Iroquois country. It brought widespread destruction and much suffering and starvation. Spencer C. Tucker

Chesapeake, Second Battle of the | 53

Further Reading Eckert, Allan W. The Wilderness War. Boston: Little, Brown, 1978. Graymont, Barbara. The Iroquois in the American Revolution. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1972. Kelsey, Isabel. Joseph Brant, 1743–1807: Man of Two Worlds. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1984. Stone, William L. Border Wars of the American Revolution. 2 vols. New York: A. L. Fowle, 1900. Swiggert, Howard. War out of Niagara: Walter Butler and His Tory Rangers. Port Washington, NY: I. J. Friedman, 1963.

Chesapeake, Second Battle of the(September 5, 1781) The naval battle of the Chesapeake, technically the Second Battle of the Chesapeake and also known as the Battle of the Virginia Capes or simply the Battle of the Capes, was fought between the British and French fleets off the coast of Virginia and was one of the decisive battles, land or sea, of the American Revolutionary War. French admiral François-Joseph-Paul, comte de Grasse-Tilly, with a powerful fleet of 28 ships of the line, had been campaigning in the West Indies. Indeed, after France’s entrance into the war in 1778, both Britain and France had deployed major fleets to the West Indies to try to secure the lucrative sugar trade of the other. De Grasse, however, planned to bring his fleet north during hurricane season and would then be free to act to support Continental Army and French Army land operations in North America. American commander in chief general George Washington hoped to retake New York, but de Grasse decided to sail instead

54 | Chesapeake, Second Battle of the

to Chesapeake Bay. Informed by de Grasse of his intentions, Washington immediately saw the possibilities of bagging the sizable British force under the command of Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis, then at the port of Yorktown, Virginia, on Chesapeake Bay. On August 24, Washington and French commander Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau, set out with the bulk of their forces to march southward. On August 27, British rear admiral Samuel Hood, with 14 ships of the line, stood into Chesapeake Bay on his way north from the West Indies. With no sign of the French, Hood proceeded on to New York, where he joined Rear Admiral Thomas Graves, acting commander in chief of the American station, with 5 ships of the line. Graves also had heard nothing of de Grasse but informed Hood that French commodore JacquesMelchior Saint-Laurent, comte de Barras, with 8 ships of the line, 4 frigates, and 18 transports, had sailed from Rhode Island the day before. Graves and Hood concluded, correctly, that Barras was sailing south, probably for the Chesapeake. Indeed, de Grasse had informed Barras of his intention. On August 31, Graves and Hood, with their combined 19 ships of the line, set out to intercept him. The day before, August 30, de Grasse had arrived in the Chesapeake with 28 ships of the line, 4 frigates, and 3,200 French troops under Major General Claude-Ann, marquis de Saint-Simon. Disembarking the troops, de Grasse then ordered transports and boats up the bay to ferry Washington’s forces south. Graves arrived in the Chesapeake on September 5 ahead of Barras. A French frigate signaled the British approach. Instead of swooping down on the unprepared French ships, Graves, hampered

by an inadequate signaling system and unwilling to risk a general action against a superior enemy (28 ships of the line to 19), formed his ships into a line-ahead formation and waited for de Grasse to come out. Graves flew his flag on the London (98 guns), while Hood was on the Barfleur (98 guns). De Grasse, shorthanded with 90 of his officers and 1,500 sailors on ferrying duties up the bay, was aware of his poor position but immediately set out with 24 ships of the line to meet the British. He flew his flag on the Ville de Paris (110 guns). Hood and his officers had not had time to assimilate Graves’s signals, and two signals were simultaneously flown: close action and line ahead at half a cable. Thus, while the British van bore down on the French, the British center and rear followed the van instead of closing. The vans engaged at 3:45 p.m., but the rest of both fleets remained out of the action. At 4:27 p.m., the line-ahead signal was hauled down. The situation called for initiative on the part of Hood, yet it was not until 5:20 p.m. that he attempted to close with the French, who avoided close engagement. The battle ended at sunset. The British had sustained 336 casualties and the French 221. No ships were lost on either side, although a number were damaged, and on September 11, Graves was forced to order the badly damaged Terrible (74 guns) scuttled. On the morning of September 6, there was only a slight wind, and Graves chose to attempt repairs to his ships’ masts and rigging. Inconclusive maneuvering followed over the next several days. On September 8 and 9, the French briefly gained the wind and threatened to reengage. On September 9, French frigates spotted the arrival of Barras’s ships, and de Grasse turned back to the



Chesapeake that night. Notified on September 13 that de Grasse was back in the Chesapeake but not yet aware of Barras’s arrival there, Graves then held a council of war with his captains, bringing the decision to return to New York, make repairs, and gather additional ships. He arrived off Sandy Hook on September 20. On October 19, Graves and Hood sailed again from New York, this time with 25 ships of the line, but it was too late. The Second Battle of the Chesapeake caused a near panic in Loyalist New York, and on hearing the news (before he learned of the surrender of Cornwallis), King George III wrote, “I nearly think the empire ruined.” British prime minister Lord Frederick North is said to have exclaimed, “Oh God! It is all over.” Hood lamely blamed Graves’s signals for his own failure to close during the engagement. Graves accepted responsibility but faced no recrimination. The battle doomed Cornwallis. Cut off from reinforcement, on October 19, the same day Graves set out again, Cornwallis surrendered his army, which represented one-third of the British Army strength in North America. This brought down the British government and led London to seek peace. Thus, a largely inconclusive tactical naval battle ranks as one of the most significant strategic victories in world history. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Larrabee, Harold A. Decision at the Chesapeake. London: William Kimber, 1965. Syrett, David. The Royal Navy in American Waters, 1775–1783. Aldershot, UK: Scolar, 1989. Tilley, John A. The British Navy and the American Revolution. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1987.

Clark’s Illinois Campaign | 55

Clark’s Illinois Campaign (1778–1779) By 1776, the few white settlers in presentday Kentucky found themselves under attack by Native Americans from north of the Ohio River, having been encouraged by British lieutenant governor Henry Hamilton at Detroit. At the time, the area west of the Appalachian Mountains was claimed by Virginia. In the summer of 1776, one of the Kentucky settlers, 24-year-old George Rogers Clark, having declared for the Patriot cause, traveled to Williamsburg, Virginia, where he petitioned Governor Patrick Henry for assistance in defending Kentucky. In response, that December, the Virginia government created Kentucky County and agreed to supply Clark with 500 pounds of gunpowder. Following his return home in March 1777, Clark was appointed major of militia, with orders to defend Kentucky. Also in the spring of 1777, the Continental Congress ordered Brigadier General Edward Hand to take command at Fort Pitt and lead a punitive expedition against the Native Americans ravaging the Ohio Country. Detroit was the key. Taking it would cut off the supply of guns, ammunition, and rum. However, the murder by American troops of Shawnee chief Cornstalk, who was being held as a hostage, drove the Shawnees into a fury. War parties crossed the Ohio and attacked the settlements, precluding Hand from taking the offensive. Numerous skirmishes near Fort Hand claimed the lives of some 40 settlers, and it was not until February 1778 that Hand able to set out with some 500 men. His goal was the British base of Fort Sandusky. Melting snow and rain-swelled rivers forced him to abandon the effort, known as the “Squaw Campaign,” and a disheartened Hand resigned his commission.

56 | Clark’s Illinois Campaign

Congress planned another effort against Detroit in 1778, ordering Brigadier General Lachlan McIntosh, with 500 Continental Army soldiers, to Pittsburgh toward that end. McIntosh set out but had only traveled 100 miles when supplies ran out and the enlistments of the militia accompanying him expired, forcing an end to that effort as well. Relieved upon his own request, he was replaced in early 1779 by experienced Indian fighter colonel Daniel Brodhead. But before Brodhead could move, the situation in the Ohio Valley had changed dramatically for the Americans, thanks to Clark. Clark had been busy. While fending off Native American attacks during the summer and fall of 1777, he became convinced that Americans should attempt to wrest the Northwest Territory from the British. The sure way to accomplish this was to take Detroit. In October, Clark returned to Williamsburg and persuaded Governor Henry to accept his idea. Success would relieve the pressure on Kentucky and loosen the British hold on all the territory north of the Ohio. It could also mean immense future benefits to Virginia. The plan was approved by the Virginia General Assembly, which, however, was not informed of its true aims. Publicly, Clark was to raise troops to defend Kentucky, but his secret instructions called on him to take Kaskaskia and, if feasible, Detroit. Commissioned a lieutenant colonel in the Virginia Militia, in the spring of 1778, Clark organized his expeditionary force near Louisville. He was well aware that most of the white settlers in the region were of French extraction, and he saw them as potential allies. On June 26, Clark set out with 175 men from Corn Island, at the Falls of the Ohio, down the Ohio River in flatboats to old Fort Massac, about 10 miles below the mouth of the Tennessee River. Well aware

that he would not be able to surprise Kaskaskia by proceeding upriver on the Mississippi, he hid his boats and set out to march overland across the Illinois Country toward Kaskaskia, located at the confluence of the Illinois and Kaskaskia Rivers, about 120 miles distant. Their guide lost his way but found it again upon being threatened with death. The expeditionary force arrived at Kaskaskia on the evening of July 4. Clark’s men had not eaten in two days and were determined to take the place or die in the attempt. Surprising the garrison in the middle of the night, the men took Kaskaskia without a shot being fired. Clark then informed the French-speaking inhabitants of the treaty of alliance between France and the United States and secured oaths of loyalty from them. The bell of the local church that rang when the town was secure came to be known as the “Liberty Bell of the West.” Father Pierre Gibault, a Catholic priest, proved to be a critical ally. He agreed to assist Clark upon the latter’s assurance that the Catholic Church would be protected under the laws of Virginia. Clark then extended his authority over other French settlements in the vicinity. Immediately on taking Kaskaskia, he sent Captain James Bowman and 30 men to secure both Prairie de Rocher and Cahokia. They submitted to American rule without a fight. Gibault proved to be invaluable. He agreed to carry letters to the French settlers at Vincennes. That British outpost (there were no British regulars present at its Fort Sackville) pledged its loyalty to the United States on July 20, and shortly thereafter, Clark sent Captain Henry Helm and a small force to occupy Fort Sackville in August. The threat to the Americans, of course, was a British counterattack from Detroit. Learning of Clark’s occupation of the

Clinton, Sir Henry | 57



Illinois Country, on October 7, Hamilton set out with 175 troops, mostly FrenchCanadian militiamen, and 60 Indians to retake the lost posts. Despite the onset of winter, Hamilton pressed on. Recruiting additional warriors as he proceeded, his force grew to about 500. The French militia at Fork Sackville refused to fight, and Helm, left with only one American soldier, had no choice but to surrender on December 17. Hamilton then suspended operations for the winter, planning to attack Kaskaskia the next spring and drive out the Americans under Clark there. On January 29, 1779, Clark learned of Hamilton’s recapture of Vincennes and decided to attempt to retake it immediately. Vincennes was 180 miles by trail from Kaskaskia, and the idea of mounting such an effort in the dead of winter seemed rash indeed, but Clark was not deterred. He set out from Kaskaskia on February 5 with some 170 men, many of them French. Following a march across the freezing marshy plains of the Illinois Country, he arrived at Vincennes on February 23. Clark warned the inhabitants of his approach. The French were asked to remain in their homes, while British sympathizers were advised to seek refuge in Fort Sackville. Clark’s force then nearly encircled the fort. Clark marched men back and forth with flags to create the impression of a far larger force. Hamilton at first refused Clark’s demands for surrender, but in the ensuing skirmishing, accurate American rifle fire killed 6 British defenders. Hamilton surrendered Fort Sackville and its 79-man garrison on February 25. Helm then took another British force of 40 men sent up the Wabash to secure supplies. Clark was now in full control of the Illinois Country.

The best-known operation in the Western theater during the American Revolutionary War, Clark’s Illinois campaign was small in size but of vast strategic importance. Although Clark was unable to secure sufficient resources to move against Detroit or to completely halt Native American raids, his accomplishment helped the United States secure the entire region from the Alleghenies to the Mississippi River in the peace settlement following the war, nearly doubling the size of the United States. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Harrison, Lowell H. George Rogers Clark and the War in the West. Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 2001. Palmer, Frederick. Clark of the Ohio: A Life of George Rogers Clark. Whitefish, MT: Kessinger Publishing, 2004. Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. 2 vols. New York: Macmillan, 1952.

Clinton, Sir Henry(1730–1795) Sir Henry Clinton was a British Army officer and the longest-serving British commander (1778–1782) in North America during the American Revolutionary War. Clinton was born into an aristocratic military family, probably on April 19, 1730. His place of birth is uncertain. He accompanied his father, Admiral George Clinton, to New York, where the elder Clinton was royal governor during 1743–1753. Henry Clinton was educated on Long Island, and during King George’s War (1744–1748), he became a lieutenant of fusiliers in 1745. He was promoted to captain in 1746. Not content with colonial service, in 1749, Clinton returned to England. There, with the patronage of his cousin, the Duke of Newcastle, he became a captain lieutenant

58 | Clinton, Sir Henry

in the elite Coldstream Guards in 1751. Clinton rose rapidly in rank and responsibility. In 1756, he became aide-de-camp to British Army commander General Lord Ligonier, and in May 1758, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel in the 1st Regiment of Foot. Clinton’s unit was assigned to Germany during the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), and Clinton later became aide-de-camp to the Prince of Brunswick. Clinton was seriously wounded in the October 1762 Battle of Freiberg, winning wide public acclaim for his role in the fighting. He returned from

Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton, commander in chief of British forces in America, 1778–1782. Although he secured the surrender of an entire American army at Charleston in 1780, Clinton was blamed for the capitulation of his subordinate, Lieutenant General Charles Cornwallis, at Yorktown in 1781. (Library of Congress)

Germany a full colonel and commander of the 12th Regiment of Foot and was promoted to brigadier general on June 24, 1763. In 1769, Clinton’s regiment was ordered to Gibraltar, where he became second-incommand of its garrison. Not known for his tact, on arrival, Clinton carried out a full inspection of Gibraltar’s defenses. Finding them wanting, he so informed the governor, who ignored his advice. Returning to England in 1770, Clinton was promoted to major general in 1772 and elected to Parliament that same year. He continued as a member of Parliament from various constituencies until 1784. That same year, he was promoted to major general, but when his wife died after giving birth to their fifth child, he was plunged into deep grief. It was several years before Clinton resumed his public duties. During 1774, he traveled to the Balkans to report on the Russian Army and visit some of the battlefields of the Russo-Turkish War (1768–1774). In February 1775, Clinton was assigned to America, where events were moving toward armed confrontation. He sailed from England on April 16 in the company of Major Generals John Burgoyne and William Howe. Arriving in Boston during the siege of that city (April 19, 1775–March 17, 1776), in May, Clinton immediately undertook a reconnaissance of the British and American works. He recommended to his superior, Lieutenant General Thomas Gage, the commander of British forces in North America, an immediate British occupation of the commanding Dorchester Heights, which Gage accepted but failed to carry out. The subsequent American emplacement of artillery from Fort Ticonderoga there rendered Boston untenable for the British. At a council of war on June 17, 1775, before the British operation in Charlestown



Neck, Clinton proposed that he land with 500 men on the western shore of Charles Town Neck, behind Breed’s Hill, thereby cutting off any Patriot retreat from the frontal assault by troops under Howe. Gage rejected this sound approach because it would have divided the British resources. After Howe’s first two assaults failed, Clinton crossed over to Charles Town Neck and organized the third and final successful assault, but the Battle of Bunker Hill was a Pyrrhic victory for the British. When Gage departed for England in September 1775, Howe assumed command of British forces in America. Clinton was promoted to acting lieutenant general and appointed second-in-command. Clinton and Howe differed in temperament and strategic views and did not get along. Clinton was therefore pleased when he was allowed to lead an expeditionary force in early 1776 against the American southern colonies. The Southern expedition was plagued with difficulties, including the late arrival of forces sent out from the British Isles. Clinton and British naval commander Commodore Sir Peter Parker decided to attempt the capture of the port city of Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina. Clinton originally objected to the plan but finally conceded. Clinton landed his men on Long Island, adjacent to Sullivan’s Island, with the principal Patriot works guarding the water approach to Charles Town. When it proved impossible to cross to Sullivan’s Island, he was forced to await the outcome of a British naval bombardment of Fort Sullivan, but this failed with the loss of a British frigate and damage to other ships. Clinton’s men were then reembarked to sail north for Howe’s invasion of New York at Staten Island. In August 1776, Howe moved against Patriot-held Long Island. Clinton went

Clinton, Sir Henry | 59

ashore with the British and German troops and developed the plan that defeated the Americans on August 26—a diversionary attack against the American center with a flanking attack on the American rear. Clinton wanted to pursue the defeated Americans, but Howe demurred, and the Patriot forces were able to escape by water to Manhattan on the night of August 29. Clinton then urged on Howe, both in council and privately, a flanking attack to trap the American forces on Manhattan, but Howe rejected this. Clinton then led the advance units that pushed Continental Army commander general George Washington northward from New York City in a series of battles. Clinton continued to urge on Howe strategies that would have defeated Washington’s army, but Howe was set on securing and holding as much territory as possible. Tired of Clinton’s continued harping, Howe assigned him the capture of the port city of Newport, Rhode Island. Before departing, Clinton advised Howe not to establish a string of outposts in western New Jersey, pointing out that they would be vulnerable to Patriot attack. Howe rejected this wise counsel, which would have prevented the important Patriot victories of Trenton (December 26, 1776) and Princeton (January 3, 1777). On December 8, 1776, Clinton and his 7,000-man expeditionary force easily took Newport. Then, having secured permission from Howe, Clinton sailed for England on January 13, 1777, to attend to family affairs and also to clear his name for the 1776 Charles Town debacle. There, he learned that a rival, Lieutenant General John Burgoyne, had been given command of British troops in Canada for an invasion of New York state. Clinton threatened to resign and make public his criticisms of the conduct of the war. Desperate to prevent this, the

60 | Clinton, Sir Henry

secretary of state for America, Lord George Germain, who was directing the war, secured for Clinton the Order of the Bath and a promotion to permanent lieutenant general. Knighted on April 11, Clinton sailed shortly thereafter and returned to New York City on July 6. Howe was now determined to move against the Patriot capital of Philadelphia and, discounting Clinton’s doubts about such a venture, departed by water shortly thereafter, leaving Clinton to defend the New York area with 7,000 men, many of whom were German troops and Loyalists. Howe captured Philadelphia, but Burgoyne’s invasion of upper New York stalled; he requested assistance from Clinton. With the arrival of reinforcements from England, Clinton moved up the Hudson Highlands beginning on October 3, capturing the Patriot fortifications there and proceeding upriver a considerable distance, but Clinton saw this as a diversion, not as a real effort to join hands with Burgoyne. Already in crisis, Burgoyne was forced to surrender on October 17. With this, Clinton’s victories went for naught, and he was forced to abandon his Hudson Highlands conquests by early November. In October 1777, Howe informed Clinton that he was resigning his post. On February 4, 1778, London accepted Howe’s resignation and named Clinton as his replacement. Clinton took command at Philadelphia in May. The American victory at Saratoga led France to publicly recognize the United States, and this led Britain to declare war. The struggle for America now became a world war, with the West Indies a primary theater of war. London ordered Clinton to send 5,000 men there and 2,000 to West Florida and also to take Georgia.

First, Clinton had to evacuate Philadelphia. On June 28, 1778, Washington, seeking to cut off the British rear guard, fought an large, inconclusive battle with Clinton at Monmouth, New Jersey. Clinton then continued his march and embarkation by water to New York City, where, forced to send men to the West Indies, West Florida, and Georgia and with the French fleet active, he remained largely on the defensive for two years. Clinton did send forces against the Virginia coast in May 1779, and he took 6,000 men up the Hudson to capture the American forts at Stony Point and Verplanck’s Point, threatening the Patriot bastion of West Point. Clinton hoped that this would force Washington into an offensive, but the Continental Army commander refused to hazard his army. Clinton also permitted raids against Connecticut under Brigadier General William Tryon, the former royal governor of New York. The brutality of these raids, which destroyed much civilian property and only stiffened Patriot resolve, angered Clinton. Long-awaited British reinforcements arrived at New York in August 1779. Clinton and Lord Germain now decided to follow up on the December 1778 capture of Savannah, Georgia, with a shift to a southern strategy. British forces would secure control of the presumed more Loyalist South. Once they captured an area, it would be turned over to Loyalist forces to hold. With Georgia and the Carolinas secured, British forces would then march northward into Virginia. The campaign opened with a spectacular success. In May 1780, Clinton’s forces captured Charles Town in what was the largest surrender of Continental Army troops in the war and the high point of his military career. However, Clinton had to deal with

Coercive Acts | 61



his second-in-command, installed by London, Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis, and Cornwallis insisted on acting independently of Clinton’s orders. Clinton was informed that a member of Cornwallis’s staff had also made disparaging remarks about Clinton, a charge that Cornwallis denied but an incident that left both men distrustful of the other. Clinton then returned to New York, leaving Cornwallis in the South with instructions to secure South Carolina and, if circumstances permitted, conquer North Carolina and then move against Virginia. Clinton remained largely quiescent in New York, except for a failed effort to take Newport, then held by the French. Cornwallis meanwhile, although he failed to secure the Carolinas, moved into Virginia in the spring of 1781, believing that he must prevent supplies from Virginia reaching the Carolinas. He launched his Virginia campaign with a series of raids. Unhappy with this strategy and threatened by a combined Continental and French Army force in New York, Clinton ordered Cornwallis to send some of his best troops north. Germain, however, overruled the order, insisting that Cornwallis retain his entire force. Increasingly chafing at Clinton’s orders, Cornwallis moved to Yorktown, Virginia, where he might be supported by the Royal Navy. British naval control of Chesapeake Bay was lost in the Second Battle of the Chesapeake (September 5, 1781), and American and French forces came down from New York to commence a siege of Yorktown that ended in its surrender (October 19, 1781). Clinton received some measure of blame for appearing indifferent to the plight of his subordinate by being too late with a relief expedition.

Clinton then unwisely sought to shift blame for the deteriorating military situation on the British government. Unlike Clinton, Cornwallis had powerful supporters in England, including King George III, so Clinton was blamed for the Yorktown debacle. Replaced by Lieutenant General Sir Guy Carleton on May 5, 1782, Clinton returned home. Failing to secure the military hearing he sought to clear his reputation, in 1783, he published Narrative of the Campaign of 1781 in North America, in which he blamed its failure on Cornwallis. Cornwallis then launched his own public response, blaming Clinton. Time worked to Clinton’s advantage. Reelected to Parliament in 1790, he received promotion to full general in 1793. He was then named governor of Gibraltar, but he died in London on December 23, 1795, before he could assume that post. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Billias, George, ed. George Washington’s Opponents: British Generals and Admirals of the American Revolution. New York: Morrow, 1969. Wilcox, William B., ed. The American Rebellion: Sir Henry Clinton’s Narrative of His Campaigns, 1775–1782. Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1971. Wilcox, William B. Portrait of a General: Sir Henry Clinton in the War for Independence. New York: Knopf, 1964.

Coercive Acts(March–June 1774) The Coercive Acts were a series of punitive measures enacted by the British Parliament between March and June 1774,

62 | Coercive Acts

chiefly in response to the Boston Tea Party of December 16, 1773. That incident involved American colonists dumping some 136,000 pounds of valuable tea into Boston Harbor in defiance of the much-reviled British tea tax. Beginning in March 1774, the British government, under Prime Minister Lord Frederick North, 2nd Earl of Guilford, passed the first of four laws that would collectively be known as the Coercive (or Intolerable) Acts. These acts impacted not just Boston but all of Massachusetts and the remainder of the colonies. Not all politicians in London agreed with the measures, however. Edmund Burke and William Pitt the Elder were particularly vocal and critical of the punitive legislation, arguing that it would only serve to provoke more protests and unite the colonists against the Crown. They also asserted that the Coercive Acts abrogated the rights of American colonists, who were still British subjects and thus protected by English rights. The acts nevertheless sailed through Parliament by a large margin. The first act, known as the Boston Port Act, closed the port of Boston until the British East India Company and the customs service had been paid in full for tea that had been thrown overboard during the Boston Tea Party. While firewood and food could still be delivered to the port of Boston, the official port of entry was moved to Marblehead, and the capital of Massachusetts was transferred to Salem. This act, enacted in March, seriously threatened Boston’s economy. Parliament passed two additional acts in May. The Massachusetts Government Act, the most extreme of the Coercive Acts, fundamentally altered the province’s charter. It significantly increased the royal governor’s power by replacing the elected council with an appointed one. It also restricted town meetings to one per calendar year to discourage political dissent and empowered

the governor to name or remove judges and law enforcement officials at will. This act all but ended local self-government. The third act, also passed in May, was the Administration of Justice Act. It allowed the royal governor of a colony to move trials to other colonies or even to England if he believed that the jury would not be impartial. This act protected British officials, who were then encouraged to enforce the new harsher laws with vigor. For example, any officials who were accused of capital crimes during the suppression of riots or during tax revenue collections could be tried across the Atlantic. This outraged many colonists, for they now feared that criminal acts or atrocities committed by British officials might well go unpunished. The fourth act, passed in June 1774, a revision of the Quartering Act of 1765, gave broad authority to military commanders and allowed soldiers to be quartered in privately owned buildings at the public’s expense. It did not, however, as many claimed, permit the quartering of troops in occupied private homes. But the colonists nevertheless viewed it as an intrusion into their personal affairs and an indirect tax. The Quebec Act, although technically not part of the four Coercive Acts, is often grouped with them because it brought the American colonists one step closer to rebellion. Quebec was a newly acquired British territory, received from France at the end of the French and Indian War (1754–1763). In this legislation, passed in June 1774, Parliament granted greater religious freedom to the Catholics in Quebec. This alarmed American Protestants, who linked Catholicism with despotism. If Catholics were given favored status in Quebec, who was to say they would not secure favored status in Massachusetts, New York, or Pennsylvania? The Quebec Act essentially provided French



civil law and religious freedom to the people of Quebec while Parliament was abrogating English rights in the 13 colonies. It also extended the territory of Quebec to the Ohio River, voiding the sea-to-sea boundaries of charters in Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. The Coercive Acts and the Quebec Act reached far beyond Massachusetts. Together, these acts confirmed the fears of many colonists that Parliament would continue to impinge on their fundamental rights. The colonial response to the legislation, as Burke and Pitt had warned, fostered greater colonial unanimity and only embroiled the Crown in more colonial unrest. In support of the people of Massachusetts, colonists from all over shipped food and supplies to Boston. The acts also encouraged the formation of Committees of Correspondence and provincial congresses. In many ways, the Coercive Acts proved to be the tipping point for many colonists, and there would be no easy way to undo them short of rebellion. Lori Brown and Paul G. Pierpaoli Jr.

Further Reading Ammerman, David. In the Common Cause: American Response to the Coercive Acts of 1774. New York: Norton, 1975. Danver, Steven L. Revolts, Protests, Demonstrations, and Rebellions in American History. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2010. Faragher, John Mack, Mari Jo Buhle, Daniel Czitrom, and Susan H. Armitage. Out of Many: A History of the American People. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1995.

Constitution of the United States(1787) The U.S. Constitution is the supreme law of the United States of America. Drafted in

Constitution of the United States | 63

1787, it functions as the blueprint for the organization of the U.S. government and establishes the relationship of the federal government to the individual states and citizens within the United States. The Articles of Confederation was the first constitution for the United States. It was drafted in 1776 when representatives of the 13 colonies met as a Continental Congress. A committee chaired by John Dickinson of Pennsylvania drew up the document, which created a national government called the Congress of the Confederation. By February 23, 1779, the Articles of Confederation had been ratified by 12 states, and when Maryland ratified the document on March 1, 1781, it went into effect. The American Revolutionary War officially ended on September 3, 1783, with the Treaty of Paris, and Americans were euphoric over their independence. The euphoria proved fleeting, however, for postwar economic and political problems brought tremendous pressures on the new government. Throughout the 1780s, calls to reform the Articles of Confederation, which proved inadequate to many challenges, mounted. Leaders advocating such changes included George Washington, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton, who feared that the United States was sliding into anarchy and perhaps even civil war. Under the Articles of Confederation, the Congress of the Confederation (which was unicameral) consisted of delegates from each of the 13 states, with each state having one vote; the delegates voted as states and not as individuals. For legislation to pass Congress, affirmative votes by 9 states were required, but amendments to the Articles of Confederation required the unanimity of all 13 states, effectively making it impossible to amend them. Several attempts to change the Articles of Confederation prior to the

64 | Constitution of the United States

adoption of the U.S. Constitution failed because of a single state’s refusal to accept it. Moreover, Congress was the solitary branch of government (there being no executive or judicial branches). Congress had the power to conduct foreign affairs, make treaties, declare war, maintain the military, coin money (although the states also had this right), and establish post offices. However, Congress was crippled under the Articles of Confederation because it lacked fiscal power. Congress could not raise money by collecting taxes or tariffs, had no control over trade between states and with foreign countries, and could not force the states to comply with national laws because there were only state courts, no national courts. Lacking fiscal power, the Congress relied on the good faith of the states to pay taxes to fund the government (based on the value of each state’s land). But requests for such funds were repeatedly ignored by the states, and with Congress lacking the power of enforcement, nothing could be done. Under these conditions, Congress quickly defaulted on the national debt, which consisted of state debts that had been taken over by the Congress of the Confederation and loans provided to Congress by foreign nations, particularly France and the Dutch Republic. It also proved impossible for Congress to fund a credible army or raise a navy. In June 1784, the army was gutted, leaving just 80 artillery men to guard West Point, New York, and Fort Pitt, Pennsylvania. Later that year, Congress did approve a 700-man army to be made up of militiamen from four states, but this force was woefully inadequate for a nation as large as the United States. Because the Articles of Confederation had no power to regulate commerce or trade between the states, bitter tariff and trade

wars erupted among them. In addition to a depleted treasury, paper money was flooding the country because both the states and the Congress were issuing currency simultaneously, creating extraordinary inflation. Meanwhile, a deepening economic depression was taking its toll on many small farmers, some of whom were being jailed for outstanding debts; by the mid-1780s, numerous farms were being confiscated and sold for taxes owed. In the last half of 1786, a popular uprising began in western Massachusetts known as Shays’ Rebellion, led by the bankrupt farmer and former army captain Daniel Shays. For approximately six months, Shays and his rebels attempted to control the western Massachusetts countryside, taking over local courts and threatening to overthrow the Massachusetts government. Congress was powerless to respond. Although the insurrection was put down by militia from eastern Massachusetts state troops in February 1787, the incident confirmed the fears of many that anarchy was just around the corner and that the government under the Articles of Confederation was powerless to stop it. Alarmed that more insurrections might erupt, the Congress promptly called a convention in Philadelphia “to revise and enlarge” the Articles of Confederation. The Philadelphia Convention opened on May 25, 1787, in the Pennsylvania State House, with guards stationed outside to keep curious onlookers away. The 75 delegates were appointed by their respective state legislatures, and 55 actually attended, representing 12 states. Rhode Island refused to participate, suspecting, correctly, that the aim of the convention was to abolish the Articles of Confederation altogether. George Washington was unanimously chosen as the president of the convention— giving it legitimacy and prestige that would



be vital for the convention’s work to be accepted by the American people. Many, but not all, of the delegates regarded the Articles of Confederation as a failure and recognized the need for a stronger, more powerful national government, one capable of providing order and stability. A few delegates merely wanted to amend the Articles of Confederation, as they were empowered to do. The delegates favoring a new constitution, such as James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, and James Wilson, can be considered nationalists. Madison, the delegate most responsible for drafting the Constitution of 1787, wrote to fellow Virginia delegate governor Edmund Randolph on April 8, 1787, outlining his ideas for a new national government, which were similar to what the convention actually adopted. Arguing that the strong powers that each state enjoyed under the Articles of Confederation were utterly irreconcilable with concentrated national power and unity, Madison wrote, “Let it be tried then, whether any middle ground can be taken which will support the supremacy of the national authority,” while maintaining state power only when “subordinately useful” to national power. This middle ground would become known as federalism: the division of power between a national government and state governments, with the national government possessing more power than that of the states. During the Philadelphia Convention, three separate plans of government were introduced: the Virginia Plan of James Madison, the New Jersey Plan of William Paterson, and the New York Plan of Alexander Hamilton. The Virginia Plan—admittedly with some major changes to it—along with major provisions from the New Jersey Plan would most closely approximate the U.S. Constitution. The New York Plan proposed

Constitution of the United States | 65

by Hamilton on June 18 was considered too extreme by most delegates, as it was based on the British system of government. The Virginia Plan was introduced on May 29 by Edmund Randolph. Madison’s proposed “national” government consisted of three “supreme” branches—legislative, executive, and judicial—with each branch structured to check the other. Highly centralized, the legislative branch would have broad authority to make law and would also have veto power over laws enacted by state legislatures and the authority to use force against any state not meeting its national obligations. These two provisions would later be eliminated, however, to secure support from delegates who feared a too powerful national government. Membership in the new bicameral Congress, unlike the Congress of the Confederation, would be based on population, but this too would be altered. In any case, the basic outline of the Virginia Plan would make its way into the U.S. Constitution. The Virginia Plan, however, alarmed those delegates who feared a strong, powerful national government and also worried that such a government would be dominated by the larger or more populous states. On June 13, delegates from smaller states rallied around proposals offered by New Jersey delegate William Paterson to retain the Articles of Confederation but strengthen the powers of the Congress of the Confederation. The “New Jersey resolutions” authorized Congress to raise revenues and regulate commerce among the states and with foreign countries—provisions incorporated into the U.S. Constitution as powers of Congress—and also provided that acts of Congress and ratified treaties with other nations be “the supreme law of the States.” The defeat of the New Jersey Plan signaled that the convention was moving

66 | Constitution of the United States

toward creation of an entirely new national government with greatly expanded powers. The supporters of the Virginia Plan were able to persuade most of the convention delegates that any new constitution for the United States of America should be ratified through conventions of the people and not by the Congress of the Confederation and the state legislatures. This was a brilliant move, because much opposition to any new constitution would come from the Congress and the state legislatures. By directly bringing the issue before the people of each state, ratification would be more likely. To secure the support of the small states, which insisted that representation in one house of the new Congress be equally apportioned among all states, a compromise was reached based on a proposal introduced by Roger Sherman of Connecticut: membership in the House would be based on population (as stipulated in the Virginia Plan), and representation in the Senate (per the New Jersey Plan) would be equal among all states. A compromise was also made between Northern and Southern delegates over the method by which slaves were to be counted for purposes of taxation and representation. It was agreed that representation in the House of Representatives would be based on the number of free persons and three-fifths of “all other persons,” a euphemism for slaves, while another compromise established that direct taxation would be based on the white inhabitants and threefifths of the “other people,” or slaves. New England delegates also agreed to allow the importation of slaves for 20 years in exchange for Southerners accepting a clause that required only a simple majority to vote on commerce laws, as opposed to a supermajority as was originally planned. The Thirteenth Amendment (which banned

slavery in 1865) rendered these compromises over slavery null and void. How to select the judges for the national courts was also a product of compromise. The Virginia Plan had called for the Congress to select the judges, but the New Jersey Plan had called for the executive branch to do that. The U.S. Constitution provides that the president nominates the judges, and the Senate confirms the nominations. The jurisdiction of the U.S. courts includes the U.S. Constitution, U.S. laws, treaties, disputes between two states, maritime and bankruptcy cases, and cases involving foreign ambassadors and public ministers of foreign governments accused of crimes in the United States, but Congress can add to the court’s jurisdiction. The only court specifically mentioned in the U.S. Constitution is the U.S. Supreme Court; however, the Constitution specifically authorizes Congress to create lower U.S. courts. In 1789, Congress created U.S. district (trial) courts and U.S. courts of appeal. The U.S. Supreme Court is almost exclusively an appeals court, but it does have sole authority (original jurisdiction) to hear disputes between states and cases involving foreign ambassadors and public ministers from foreign governments. The Constitution also leaves it to Congress to determine the number of federal judges, including on the U.S. Supreme Court. One of the last major unresolved problems was the method of electing the president. A number of proposals, including direct election by the people, by state legislatures, by state governors, and by the Congress, were considered. The result, like almost everything about the U.S. Constitution, was a compromise: the electoral college. The large states received proportional strength in the number of delegates or electors based on the number of members of the House and



Senate from each state, the state legislatures received the right of selecting the electors, and the House of Representatives received the right to choose the president (and the Senate the vice president) in the event no candidate received an absolute majority (50 percent plus one) of electoral votes. The U.S. Constitution created a strong, powerful national government and weakened the states, but the separation of powers and a system of checks and balances minimized the twin threats of abuse of power and tyranny. The U.S. government now possessed taxing and spending powers and also the authority to regulate commerce among the states and with foreign countries. With its own bureaucracy—lodged in the executive branch headed by a president—it no longer relied on the states to comply or enforce national law. Coupled with the supremacy clause and the existence of a national court system, a method now existed for resolving disputes not only between the states but also between the U.S. government and the states. The creation of an executive branch headed by a president—responsible for conducting foreign relations (including negotiating treaties subject to approval by the U.S. Senate by a two-thirds vote), enforcing the law, and acting as commander in chief of the military— promised to bring order and stability for the United States. However, delegating funding of the bureaucracy, including the military, to Congress and also requiring Congress to declare war balanced the president’s powers. Similarly, although Congress has the authority to collect and spend money and also make laws, the president’s veto power acts as a check against Congress. Congress can override the president’s veto (per a two-thirds majority in both houses of Congress) and impeach or remove from office members of the executive and judicial branches for

Constitution of the United States | 67

committing “high crimes (or felonies) and misdemeanors.” To prevent Congress from manipulating or controlling the other two branches of government, federal judges serve for life, subject to good behavior, and can only be removed for high crimes and misdemeanors. Also, their salaries cannot be reduced, and the president’s salary cannot be changed while in office, guaranteeing independence for the executive and judicial branches. Furthermore, an independent judiciary is better ensured because both the president and the Senate select federal judges. Finally, to minimize the danger of tyranny of the majority, amending the Constitution requires a supermajority, with either two-thirds of Congress or two-thirds of the state legislatures proposing amendments and then either three-quarters of the state legislatures or three-quarters of state constitutional conventions called by the state legislatures ratifying the amendments. This gives the states a critical role and voice in the U.S. Constitution and national politics as well as presidential elections, because the state legislatures are authorized to select the members of the electoral college and also determine how they award their electoral college votes, although Congress can overrule the electoral college if in Congress’s judgment fraud has occurred in the presidential election or if no candidate has won a majority of the electoral college vote. Supporters of the U.S. Constitution became known as Federalists because the U.S. Constitution created a federal system of government. The opponents of the U.S. Constitution became known as Anti-Federalists. Ratification of the U.S. Constitution by the people represented in state constitutional conventions occurred between 1787 and 1789. Realizing that unanimity was unlikely, the U.S. Constitution specified that only 9

68 | Continental Army

out of 13 states had to ratify the Constitution for the Articles of Confederation to be abolished and the new system of government to take effect. The perceived failure of the Articles of Confederation, the fact that many supporters of states’ rights boycotted the Philadelphia Convention, and the method of ratification greatly assisted the Federalists in convincing most of the people of each state to ratify the U.S. Constitution. In addition, the fact that the convention’s meetings were not open to the public caught the AntiFederalists by surprise, handicapping their ability to organize an effective opposition. Delaware was the first state to ratify the Constitution by a vote of 30–0 on December 7, 1787. Two other states also ratified in 1787: Pennsylvania (46–23) and New Jersey (38–0). Georgia voted unanimously on January 2, 1788, and Connecticut voted 128–40 seven days later. However, the vote in Massachusetts, on February 6, 1788, was very close: 186–168. With New Hampshire ratifying on June 21, nine states had ratified the Constitution. Virginia ratified on June 25 by a slim vote of 89–79, as did New York the next day, 30–27. Rhode Island refused to convene a constitutional convention to debate ratifying the Constitution. Nevertheless, on March 4, 1789, the U.S. Congress met for the first time in New York City, and on April 30, 1789, George Washington was inaugurated as the first president of the United States under the U.S. Constitution. North Carolina ratified the Constitution on November 21, 1789, and Rhode Island ratified it one year later, on May 29, 1790. By the early 1800s the U.S. Constitution, along with the subsequent Bill of Rights and other amendments, had created a robust national government while protecting individual and states’ rights. The U.S. government was finally able to get its financial

house in order and, most significantly for military matters, was able to fund an army and a navy with clear lines of authority regarding their operations and overall policy. Stefan M. Brooks

Further Reading Bowman, Catherine. The Miracle at Philadelphia. Boston: Little, Brown, 1987. Madison, James. The Constitutional Convention: A Narrative History from the Notes of James Madison. New York: Modern Library, 2005. O’Stewart, David. The Summer of 1787. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2008. Storing, Herbert. What the Anti-Federalists Were For: The Political Thought of the Opponents of the Constitution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988.

Continental Army The Continental Army, the first regular army of the 13 colonies and then the United States, was established from scratch but grew to considerable proficiency as the American War of Independence went on. In 1783, as the conflict was drawing to a close, General George Washington, commander in chief of the Continental Army, wrote that future generations would find it difficult to understand how his soldiers had prevailed. Outnumbered, half-starved, often clothed in rags, without regular pay, and suffering almost unbearable distresses, these men continued to fight on, manifesting the civic virtue that many Americans claimed was the war’s highest goal. Some 230,000 of them, over the course of eight years, served in the Continental Army. They suffered terrible defeats on numerous battlefields, their units almost disintegrating at times, but the men always answered the call in time to



avert national defeat. Certainly, their British foes were baffled and often angered by their perseverance. Without them, the American revolutionaries would certainly have failed. When the war began at Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, on April 19, 1775, the rebelling colonists had neither an army nor a navy. They lacked a centralized government to direct military operations and had no currency to finance a war. The seeds from which the Continental Army grew were the militia organizations familiar to the colonists from New Hampshire to Georgia. The first American fighters who confronted British regulars were minutemen, who had been established by the rebellious Massachusetts government in October 1774. At that time, there was a general reorganization of the militia in the face of the British military threat in Boston. The same sorts of militia reorganizations were going on in most of the other colonies as the rebels purged Loyalist officers and took control of militias for constabulary duties and defense. Lieutenant General Thomas Gage, the governor of Massachusetts and commander in chief of the British Army in America, had 4,000 troops at his disposal in Boston, and New England officials feared that he would let loose his redcoats on the countryside. On April 23, 1775, four days after the battles at Lexington and Concord, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress voted to raise an army of 13,000 men, which would be supplemented by 17,000 more from other New England colonies. Massachusetts militia under the leadership of Brigadier General William Heath blockaded Gage’s soldiers in Boston, and over the next few months, about 16,000 American soldiers surrounded the city. By June, Massachusetts had raised 26 regiments, and Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New Hampshire

Continental Army | 69

had raised 3 each. Some of these troops fought in the Battle of Bunker Hill on June 17. Meanwhile, New York had organized a separate force of 5,000 men. On June 14, 1775, the Second Continental Congress, meeting in Philadelphia, assumed responsibility for these regular troops, about 39 regiments of infantry plus 1 regiment and 1 company of artillery. This date is considered to be the founding date of the U.S. Army. Congress also voted to raise 10 companies of Continental troops on a oneyear enlistment, with riflemen from Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, and Virginia to be used at Boston as light infantry. In 1776, these troops became the 1st Continental Regiment. Congress also assumed responsibility for the New England Army and urged other New England colonies to forward their troops to Boston as quickly as possible. In July, Congress adopted the New York troops, designating the state as the New York Department. Soon the legislators would also create the Canadian, Eastern, Middle, and Southern Departments and appoint generals to command each one. As Congress had no taxing power to pay for the Continental Army, the states were instructed to form and pay for more than 50 line regiments, to be officered by men from the various states. Many of these lines, such as the Delaware and Maryland Continentals, became famous for their distinguished service in fighting for independence. Establishing pay grades for the Continental troops, Congress assigned a captain $20 per month, a lieutenant $13.33, a sergeant $8, a corporal $7.33, and a private $6.66. From these funds, the soldiers were expected “to find their own arms and cloaths.” Because of the central government’s financial difficulties, which led to long-term runaway inflation, Continental

70 | Continental Army

soldiers were often not paid these salaries and many times suffered genuine and ongoing hardships. Some soldiers came to resent government officials, thinking, probably unfairly, that they feared their own army as a potential instrument of oppression almost as much as they did the British redcoats. Soldiers in the Continental Army were citizens who volunteered to serve, and at various times during the war, they signed up for enlistment periods that varied from one to three years or the duration of the war. Early in the war, enlistment contracts were short, for the people of America had an aversion to standing armies and were afraid that the Continental Army would become permanent. Also, the citizens, after a short period of enthusiasm, did not exactly flock to join the new Continental Army. Hence, Washington and his officers had to deal with small forces in comparison with their British enemy. The Continental Army was never larger than 17,000 soldiers and was usually much smaller than that. The officers had to rely on militiamen to supplement these numbers, and many of the officers, Washington included, did not have confidence in these troops. Turnover of manpower was a constant problem, especially in the first two winters of the war, when Washington’s army virtually dissolved and was practically replaced with another set of soldiers. After these crises, Congress finally voted to extend the terms of enlistment to three years or the length of the war. On June 15, 1775, by a unanimous vote, Congress elected George Washington as commander in chief with the rank of general. His pay was established at $500 per month to cover all his expenses. Washington declined the salary but did say that he would accept reimbursement for his expenses. Over the next few days, Congress elected four major generals (Artemas Ward,

Charles Lee, Philip Schuyler, and Israel Putnam) and eight brigadier generals (Seth Pomeroy, Richard Montgomery, David Wooster, William Heath, Joseph Spencer, John Thomas, John Sullivan, and Nathanael Greene). Pomeroy declined the appointment, and his position remained unfilled. Horatio Gates was elected adjutant general, with the rank of brigadier general. Washington and Gates, both Virginians, arrived together at Boston in early July 1775, and Washington took command of his new Continental Army. Gates, a former British Army officer, assumed responsibility for most administrative matters and began restructuring the army along British lines. By October, Washington had imposed discipline on the 22,000 men who composed his command, creating three divisions and six brigades from the 38 regiments that had finally been embodied. Although he contemplated attacking Gage’s soldiers in Boston, his officers dissuaded him, so until the following spring, the status quo prevailed there. Thus, in 1775, the New York Continentals, with Major General Schuyler in command, became the first national units to see action. On August 31, having organized his forces, he launched an invasion of Canada northward toward Montreal, with another American force under Colonel Benedict Arnold advancing toward Quebec through Maine. The two armies met at Quebec on December 1 and, because American enlistments were expiring on December 31, launched a disastrous assault on the city. Although these troops were driven from Canada in the spring of 1776, they had surprised British governor Guy Carleton with their ability to sustain such an operation. The army fell back to Fort Ticonderoga and prepared for a British counterinvasion into upstate New York in 1776.



With the end of the original Continental enlistments in 1775, Congress proceeded to reorganize the army on November 4. Beginning on January 1, 1776, the Continental Army, exclusive of artillery and extra regiments, was to consist of 27 state line regiments. The troops were to be enlisted for one year’s service. Each regiment was to have an official number of 728 officers and men in eight companies and was to be recognized by numbers instead of names. This idea did not last long. The quota of regiments assigned to the states were 1 from Pennsylvania, 3 from New Hampshire, 16 from Massachusetts, 2 from Rhode Island, and 5 from Connecticut. The campaign of 1776 was a test of this new military organization. Washington and his generals continued to experiment with systems of supply and, of course, had to train all the new recruits. In March, the British withdrew from Boston to Halifax, Nova Scotia, and prepared to invade New York. Washington shifted his army westward to prepare the city’s defenses. By the end of June, he commanded 17,000 Continentals and militiamen, but he faced a British army of 33,000 soldiers. From July to December 1776, his army suffered a series of defeats in battle, losing New York to British occupation and retreating across New Jersey to Pennsylvania. Although Washington managed a counterstroke at Trenton and Princeton at the end of the year, his army was decimated. In upstate New York, the enemy was temporarily checked on Lake Champlain but continued to threaten the rebel cause in the next campaign. During the winter of 1776–1777, Washington worked with Congress to reorganize his army once more. The congressmen, many of whom were still wary of “standing armies in peacetime,” bowed to the inevitable logic that America was not at peace but

Continental Army | 71

at war. Hence, they finally accepted Washington’s and other officers’ pleas to create a more permanent army, extending enlistment terms to three years or the length of the war to avert the year-end crises that had twice depleted the Continental Army. Congress also passed the “Eighty-Eight Battalion Resolve,” ordering each state to contribute 1-battalion regiments in proportion to their population, and Washington subsequently was given authority to raise an additional 16 battalions. This army, which would have numbered 90,000 men, never came close to achieving its designated strength, nor was it really needed. Before the end of 1777, Congress again revised the regimental quotas, reducing the number to more manageable proportions. Other army reforms were also accomplished during this period. Congress revised the Articles of War, which outlined the rules of discipline and martial law, by using the British articles as a model. Washington contributed to this process by encouraging stricter discipline and clearer rules regarding court-martial and desertions. With military aid from the French government, Washington and his officers overhauled the system of supply for the army. The Continentals were rearmed with 25,000 French muskets and other accoutrements at a time when no other sources were available. The French also supplied 200 cannon to the artillery-strapped Continental Army. Efforts were made through the Clothier General’s Department to provide navy blue uniforms for the shabbily clad American troops, but daily wear and tear on military attire inevitably defeated this purpose. Washington continued his efforts to regularize the Continental Army by imposing more rigorous drills on his soldiers and restructuring brigades and divisions for flexibility in battle. With congressional

72 | Continental Army

approval, and to the delight of ambitious junior officers, he increased the number of brigadier generals and majors for commands in the new brigades. The military campaigns of 1777 reflected to some degree the improved training regimens established within the Continental Army, but they also indicated that American soldiers still had a lot to learn. Troops under Major General Horatio Gates in the Northern Department performed well against Lieutenant General John Burgoyne, forcing him to surrender his army on October 17 at Saratoga, New York. But twothirds of Gates’s army was composed of militiamen, and Burgoyne’s mistakes may have had as much to do with the outcome as any skill on the part of rebel officers. Washington’s army fought in the Philadelphia campaign, losing the battles at Brandywine (September 11) and Germantown (October 4) and ultimately yielding Philadelphia to enemy occupation. Nevertheless, as he went into winter quarters at Valley Forge, his army, unlike in previous campaigns, still retained its regimental organization. On February 23, 1778, Washington was joined by Major General Baron Friedrich von Steuben, inspector general of the army, who taught Prussian drill and maneuver techniques to the Continental Army. Steuben also coached the Americans in more efficient ways of loading and firing their muskets and imposed hygienic camp practices. Steuben’s training showed to good effect in the Continental Army’s subsequent fighting and campaigning. The Continental Army was also strengthened in 1777–1778 by the addition of highquality foreign officers, such as Major General Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, and Major General Johann Kalb, Baron de Kalb, of France and the Polish officer brigadier

general Count Casimir Pulaski. These officers served with great distinction in the Continental Army, providing the Americans with a great deal of sound advice about sieges, fortifications, military engineering, and the creation of legion units within the army. Lafayette was wounded in the Battle of the Brandywine and served in the Rhode Island campaign (August 8–30, 1778). Kalb led the Southern Army for a time in 1780 and was killed in the Battle of Camden, South Carolina (August 16). Pulaski died on October 11, 1779, while leading a gallant, and some thought foolhardy, charge with his Pulaski’s Legion Cavalry during the Franco-American siege of Savannah. On May 27, 1778, Washington and Congress reorganized the Continental Army yet again. Because of financial necessity, the number of regiments in the state lines was reduced to 89, the number of soldiers in a regiment to 550, the number of officers to 29, and the number of line companies to 9. Massachusetts was assigned 15 regiments, Pennsylvania and Virginia 11 each, Connecticut and Maryland 8 each, North and South Carolina 6 each, New York 5, New Hampshire and New Jersey 3 each, Rhode Island 2, and Delaware and Georgia 1 each. Congress also consolidated some of the weaker Continental regiments. Because this reorganization was proposed just as the campaign of 1778 was about to begin, it was implemented gradually over the next 10 months and finalized on March 9, 1779. The Battle of Monmouth, on June 28, 1778, was the last major battle in the North, and Washington’s victory there, although a minor one, showed that the Continental Army had improved in the past six months. In 1779, the war shifted to the Southern Department as the British implemented their southern strategy, and the fighting thereafter mostly took place in Virginia, the

Continental Army | 73



Carolinas, and Georgia. Washington’s main army was stationed on the Hudson River, north of New York, to keep an eye on the British in the city, and units were sent southward as needed. In October 1780, with the three-year enlistments of 1777 soon to expire, Congress ordered a new organization of the Continental Army, to take effect on January 1, 1781. The number of infantry regiments was reduced to 50, with only 30,000 troops to be enlisted, and the new regiments were made larger than in the last arrangement. The quota of regiments was fixed at 10 for Massachusetts; 8 for Virginia; 6 for Pennsylvania; 5 each for Connecticut and Maryland; 4 for North Carolina; 2 each for New Hampshire, New York, New Jersey, and South Carolina; and 1 each for Rhode Island, Delaware, and Georgia. For the first time, support for Continental cavalry and artillery regiments was made a state responsibility. These reforms, in addition to the chronic lack of pay and provisions for the soldiers in early 1781, triggered mutinies in some Pennsylvania and New Jersey regiments. Brigadier General Anthony Wayne quickly quashed these discontents, executing a few men as examples. The war in the Carolinas did not go well in 1780 and 1781, despite the fact that many Continental Army regiments had become powerful organizations filled with seasoned veterans. Major General Benjamin Lincoln surrendered Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, on May 12, 1780, and Gates mishandled his army at Camden, South Carolina, on August 16, almost destroying his Maryland Continental regiments. However, they were reconstituted under Major General Nathanael Greene and participated in most of Greene’s battles in 1781. When British lieutenant general Lord Charles Cornwallis marched his army to Yorktown, Virginia, Washington and his French allies

saw the chance to entrap the British in that town. On October 19, 1781, Cornwallis surrendered. Afterward, with America’s independence ensured, Congress imposed more reductions on the Continental Army, and at Newburgh, New York, in 1783, the army was gradually disbanded. Created from a humble and uncertain background, sometimes suspected by both politicians and citizens of posing a threat to America’s fragile liberty, the Continental Army that had fought valiantly for eight years disappeared without ceremony. The poor soldiers, according to Private Joseph Plumb Martin, were turned out halfstarved, ragged, and without pay or prospects. Although Martin exaggerated, his complaint contained some truth. Because Congress was bankrupt, the veterans never received the gratuity of $80 that legislators had promised them in 1778, and it was not until 1818 that the remaining survivors received pensions and not until 1828 that their pensions were made equal to their former military pay. Continental officers were treated better, but only on paper. On March 22, 1783, Congress voted to give the officers five years’ full pay rather than the half pay for life that they had been promised three years before. Because of the desperate financial straits of the central government, they never received the promised pay. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Carp, E. Wayne. To Starve the Army at Pleasure: Continental Army Administration and American Political Culture, 1775– 1783. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1984. Higginbotham, Don. The War of American Independence: Military, Attitudes, Policies, and Practice, 1763–1789. New York: Macmillan, 1971.

74 | Continental Navy Lengel, Edward G. General George Washington: A Military Life. New York: Random House, 2005. Martin, James Kirby, and Mark E. Lender. A Respectable Army: The Military Origins of the Republic, 1763–1789. Wheeling, IL: Harlan Davidson, 1982. Middlekauff, Robert. Washington’s Revolution: The Making of America’s First Leader. New York: Knopf, 2015. Neimeyer, Charles Patrick. America Goes to War: A Social History of the Continental Army. New York: New York University Press, 1996. Risch, Erna. Supplying Washington’s Army. Washington, DC: Center of Military History, United States Army, 1981. Royster, Charles. A Revolutionary People at War: The Continental Army and American Character, 1775–1783. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1979. Wright, Robert K. The Continental Army. Washington, DC: Center of Military History, United States Army, 1983

Continental Navy Naval operations were immensely important to the outcome of the American Revolutionary War. In 1775, the Royal Navy was the world’s largest naval force, and as recently as the Seven Years’ War of 1756–1763, it had defeated both the French and Spanish navies. Until 1778 and the official entry on the American side of France into the war (followed by Spain in 1779), British naval superiority was unchallenged. Indeed, in April 1775, the Americans had no navy at all. Both sides in the struggle recognized the importance of control of the seas. With it, the British could transport troops and military supplies at will to North America. Given the appalling state of land transportation in the colonies, it was an immense

advantage for the British to be able to move troops and equipment by water along the Atlantic coast and extract them should that prove necessary. Conversely, the Americans hoped to inhibit the British in such operations and carry out a war against British commerce through privateering. Both sides sought to control the continent’s great interior lakes and rivers. Continental Army commander general George Washington recognized the need for a naval force early in the war when he secured schooners in Massachusetts and sent them out to capture British supply vessels during the Siege of Boston (April 19, 1775–March 17, 1776). Although American revolutionary leaders were divided about the wisdom of expending scarce resources to equip and send out ships against the British, four separate and distinct American navies took to the seas during the war. These were “Washington’s Navy,” the 11 state navies that engaged in coast and river defense, a large number of privateers, and finally the Continental Navy. During the war, the Americans also experimented with new types of weapons, such as the submarine (inventor David Bushnell’s Turtle was the world’s first) and mines. The Continental Navy can be said to have come into being on October 13, 1775. Eight days earlier, word was received in Philadelphia that two unarmed British brigs had sailed from England for Quebec with arms, powder, and other military stores. On October 13, Congress authorized the outfitting of two vessels, one of 10 guns (destined to be the Cabot) and the other of 14 guns (to be the Andrew Doria), “for a cruise of three months” against “such transports as may be laden with warlike stores and other supplies for our enemies.” At the same time, Congress appointed a Naval Committee of three of its own members—Silas Deane, Christopher



Gadsden, and John Langdon—to supervise the work. The destruction by the Royal Navy of Falmouth, Massachusetts, on October 18 and the threat of similar attacks on other coastal towns brought increased support in Congress for the navy. On October 30, Congress approved the outfitting of two additional warships: one of 20 guns and the other of 36. These were the Columbus and Alfred. It also added another four men to the Naval Committee: John Adams, Joseph Hewes, Stephen Hopkins, and Richard Henry Lee. This brought its membership to four New Englanders and three Southerners. On November 2, 1775, the Naval Committee voted $100,000 to “obtain and equip” vessels of war. On November 10, Congress authorized the formation of a corps of two battalions of “American Marines” to provide shipboard security and antipersonnel musket fire from the fighting tops of the ships during battle. Meanwhile, Adams drew up the rules and regulations for the navy. Largely a simplification of British practice, they won congressional approval on November 28. Continental Navy administration changed during the course of the war. From December 1775 to December 1779, a per­ manent Marine Committee of 13 members, 1 from each colony, controlled naval affairs. It was replaced by a Board of Admiralty, established on October 28, 1777, that was composed of two members of Congress and three private citizens. Beginning on February 7, 1781, Alexander McDougall, who had served in the Continental Army as a major general but had been a seaman in his youth and was elected to Congress from New York, briefly served as secretary of marine. Finally, on September 7 of that same year, administration of the navy passed into the hands of Superintendent of Finance Robert Morris, who had apparently been the chief

Continental Navy | 75

figure in the civil administration of the navy for much of the war to that point. The first eight warships of the navy were all merchant conversions. The largest of these were the ships Alfred and Columbus. The Alfred (24 guns) was the first ship of the Continental Navy to fly the American flag. Lieutenant John Paul Jones raised the Grand Union flag over the Alfred on its commissioning on December 3, 1775, and the little schooner Hannah of 78 tons (4 guns) was reputedly the first armed vessel to sail under the Continental flag. The Alfred was a former merchantman of 440 tons and mounted 24 9-pounders (later reduced to 20 such guns). The Columbus (28 guns) mounted 18 9-pounders and 10 6-pounders. The remaining six vessels were the brigs Andrew Doria (14 4-pounders) and Cabot (14 6-pounders) and the sloops Providence (12 4-pounders), Hornet (8 or 10 4-pounders), Wasp (8 2-pounders), and Fly (6 9-pounders). On December 13, 1775, Congress accepted the recommendation of its Marine Committee and approved construction of 13 frigates: 5 of 32 guns, 5 of 28 guns, and 3 of 24 guns. Allocation of construction was assigned on the basis of political considerations rather than the actual ability to produce the ships. All were to be built by March 1776. These were the largest ships constructed for the Continental Navy in the war. The construction schedule for the frigates built in America was unrealistic, and only the Hancock, Boston, Raleigh, and Randolph were able to get to sea in 1777. Designed for independent service, the frigates were intended as commerce raiders. Indeed, striking at British seaborne commerce was the principal task of the Continental Navy in the war. Their largest guns were 12-pounders. On October 3, 1776, Congress authorized the purchasing, arming, and equipping of “a frigate and two

76 | Continental Navy

cutters in Europe.” The large frigate L’Indien, built in Amsterdam, had a powerful armament of 28 36-pounders in addition to 12 12-pounders, but it was the exception. Ships constructed for the Continental Navy tended to be long and narrow, large for their classes, and fast. Probably the finest ship in the Continental Navy was the frigate Alliance. Of 900 tons and commissioned in 1778, it was rated at 36 guns but actually mounted 40: 28 12-pounders and 12 9-pounders. It had a crew of 300 men. The Alliance became the flagship of John Paul Jones’s small squadron in European waters. Perhaps the most famous ship in the Continental Navy was Jones’s Bonhomme Richard. This former East Indiaman, given or loaned to the United States by France, was 900 tons, rated at 42 guns, and mounted 6 18-pounders, 28 12-pounders, and 8 9-pounders. The United States built only one ship of the line during the war, the 74-gun America, projected to carry 30 18-pounders, 32 12-pounders, and 14 9-pounders. It was one of three ships of the line authorized by Congress in November 1776; the others were never built. Constructed at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, the America was presented to France on September 2, 1782, replacing the Magnifique, a French ship of the line wrecked in Boston Harbor. The America was officially transferred to France in June 1783. On December 22, 1775, Congress appointed the first 18 officers of the Continental Navy. The senior officer was Commodore Esek Hopkins, who was accorded the title commander of the fleet. Below him were Captains Dudley Saltonstall, Abraham Whipple, Nicholas Biddle, and John Burroughs Hopkins, the commodore’s son. John Paul Jones was the top ranking of five first lieutenants. There were also five second lieutenants and four third lieutenants.

Conditions of service were difficult for the seamen. They were forced to live in cramped conditions and subsist for the most part on inadequate rations. Continental Navy sailors were volunteers, however, in the vast majority of cases. (Some Continental Army soldiers were sentenced to service in the navy as punishment for offenses.) Pay was poor, but all crew members could hope to share in the distribution of prize money if they were successful in battle. Discipline was harsh, with corporal punishment for a bewildering assortment of infractions, but conditions were far better than those for sailors in the Royal Navy, most of whom were pressed and suffered under brutal discipline. Medical services of the day were quite primitive; serious wounds usually resulted in amputation and death. During battle, surgeons, if aboard ships, set up in the cockpit belowdecks. There was little standard in uniforms. Officers might wear a blue coat with red facings and cuffs, a red waistcoat, blue breeches, and white stockings as well as a cocked hat. Midshipmen might wear a blue coat with white collar tabs and cuffs, a white waistcoat, breeches, and stockings. Seamen wore loose-fitting trousers that were wide bottomed and went to the knee, a shirt or vest, and perhaps a waistcoat with a kerchief around the neck and a broadbrimmed hat, often of straw. The marine uniform consisted of a green jacket with red collar, lapels, cuffs, and turnbacks; buff waistcoats and breeches; and a hat with cockade. In early January 1776, Congress ordered Commodore Hopkins to take his squadron to sea. His orders called on him to destroy an enemy flotilla in Chesapeake Bay organized by Royal Governor John Murray, Lord Dunmore, of Virginia, and then clear the North Carolina coast before returning to



accomplish the same off Rhode Island. On February 17, Hopkins set sail with the eight ships acquired in November 1775. On the evening of February 19, the Hornet and Fly lost contact with the other ships in the squadron and went their separate way. Taking advantage of a discretionary clause in his orders, Hopkins then ordered the squadron to sail to the Bahamas. On March 3–4, 1776, in the only successful large American fleet operation of the war, Hopkins landed 300 seamen and marines on New Providence Island and captured Nassau, securing there 73 cannon and mortars, munitions, and other military supplies. On March 17, the squadron departed on the return voyage. On April 4, in the first engagement between the Continental Navy and the British navy, one of Hopkins’s ships, the Columbus under Captain Whipple,

Continental Navy | 77

captured the British schooner Hawk (6 guns). Shortly after midnight on April 6, the American squadron fell in with the British frigate Glasgow (20 guns). The Americans mismanaged the engagement and only took the Glasgow’s tender. In the battle, the Americans suffered 10 men killed and 14 wounded, while British losses were only 1 killed and 3 wounded. On April 7, in an hourlong battle off the Virginia Capes, Captain John Barry’s Continental brigantine Lexington (14 guns) captured the British sloop Edward (6 guns). Most of the Continental Navy’s engagements were two-ship actions, and for the first two years of the war, the British were able to move by sea at will. On March 17, 1776, the British evacuated Boston and sailed to Halifax, Nova Scotia. After refitting and reorganization, in July 1776,

The Continental flag being raised aboard the brigantine Lexington (14 guns) in 1776. Operating out of French ports, the Lexington, together with the Reprisal and the Dolphin, took at least 18 British vessels in European waters before itself being captured on the return voyage to America. (National Archives)

78 | Continental Navy

British vice admiral Lord Richard Howe’s fleet landed 32,000 British troops on Staten Island to begin the New York campaign. British naval weaknesses, including numerous ships in poor repair, were not apparent as long as the nation was fighting the Continental Navy, but the entrance of France into the war openly on the side of the Americans in 1778 and then Spain in 1779 and the Dutch a year later transformed a largely localized struggle into a world war, with North America only a secondary theater for the Royal Navy, which lacked the resources to operate everywhere successfully. Only a combination of intra-allied disagreements, delays, inept allied commanders, and effective actions by outnumbered British forces saved Britain from disaster. The entry of France into the war greatly aided the meager efforts of the Continental Navy, for France provided bases and some additional ships. Meanwhile, some American captains, notably John Paul Jones and Lambert Wickes, carried the war to the British Isles and attacked British merchant shipping. Such actions forced the British to introduce convoys and shift naval assets. The energetic Jones also won the most spectacular engagement of the war, the sanguinary September 23, 1779, contest between his frigate Bonhomme Richard (44 guns) and the British frigate Serapis (44 guns). This action made Jones the first American naval hero. But for the most part, the Continental Navy accomplished little, certainly nothing of a decisive nature, during the war. In 1778, the British shifted their military operations to the American South, capturing Savannah (December 29, 1778) and then Charles Town (Charleston) (May 12, 1780). Nevertheless, the naval war was about to turn with the arrival in North American waters of French admiral François-Joseph-Paul, comte

de Grasse-Tilly, and 28 ships of the line. In the inconclusive Second Battle of the Chesapeake of September 5, 1781, he held off a British fleet under Rear Admiral Thomas Graves, making possible the Continental Army and French Army victory on land at Yorktown that led to fall of the government in London and the decision by its successor to seek peace. Meanwhile, the Continental Navy, poorly administered and supported and indifferently led, dwindled steadily in size as the war progressed. Only two of its ships, the frigates Alliance and Hague, were in service at war’s end. The last naval action of the war came on March 10, 1783, off the Atlantic coast of Florida, when Captain Barry’s frigate Alliance (36 guns) engaged the British frigate Sybil (32 guns). Although the Sybil was heavily damaged, Barry was forced to break off the battle upon the arrival of two other British warships. In all, 53 ships served in the Continental Navy during the war. All ships of the Continental Navy were sold at the end of hostilities. The Alliance was the last, in 1785. Captains such as John Paul Jones (who had hoped to be the first American admiral) who wished to pursue their profession were obliged to do so abroad in the French Navy or the Russian Navy. The Continental Navy had played only a very limited role in the war. Despite its failings, it captured or sank almost 200 British vessels, carried dispatches to and from Europe, transported funds to help finance the revolutionary cause, forced the British to divert naval assets for the protection of commerce, and helped provoke the diplomatic confrontation that brought France into the war. It also provided a training ground for many men, including John Barry, Thomas Truxtun, Richard Dale, and Joshua Barney, who would serve as officers



in a new national navy. The U.S. Navy was not officially established until 1794. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Chapelle, Howard I. The History of the American Sailing Navy: The Ships and Their Development. New York: Norton, 1949. Coggins, Jack. Ships and Seamen of the American Revolution. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole, 1969. Gardiner, Robert, ed. Navies and the American Revolution, 1775–1783. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1996. Mahan, Alfred Thayer. The Major Operations of the Navies in the War of American Independence. Boston: Little, Brown, 1913. Miller, Nathan. Sea of Glory: The Continental Navy Fights for Independence, 1775–1783. New York: David McKay, 1974. Smith, Charles R. Marines in the Revolution: A History of the Continental Marines in the American Revolution, 1775–1783. Washington, DC: History and Marines Division, U.S. Marine Corps, 1975. Tucker, Spencer C. Arming the Fleet: U.S. Naval Ordnance in the Muzzle-loading Era. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1989.

Conway Cabal(1777–1778) The Conway Cabal was an alleged attempt by Major General Horatio Gates and his supporters, both in the Continental Army and in Congress, during the winter of 1777– 1778, to replace General George Washington as commander in chief of the Continental Army. In October 1777, Brigadier General Thomas Conway, a French officer in American service, wrote Gates a letter (now lost) in which he criticized Washington as a military leader and expressed a wish to serve under Gates. Word of the letter finally

Conway Cabal | 79

filtered through to Washington, who, on November 9, 1777, wrote Conway a frosty note: “Sir: A Letter which I received last Night, contained the following paragraph. In a letter from Genl. Conway to Genl. Gates he says: ‘Heaven has been determined to save your country; or a weak general and bad councellors would have ruined it.’ I am Sir Yr. Hble. Servt.” Three weeks later, Gates, learning of this correspondence from Major General Thomas Mifflin, became aware that he was suspected of plotting against Washington. Thus emerged the so-called Conway Cabal, which Washington and his supporters believed to be directed against the commander in chief. The cabal came to light at a time when tensions were high between Congress and the Continental Army, as certain small-government legislators expressed fear that the army was not showing due subordination to civilian authority. The officers at Valley Forge, however, were in no mood to accept censure, real or imagined, from congressmen who seemed incapable of managing the war or providing them with necessary pay and provisions. They had been defeated by the British in the Battle of Brandywine (September 11, 1777), the British now occupied Philadelphia, and the Continental Army remained desperately short of provisions. In this situation, Washington and his supporters seized upon scraps of evidence that really proved nothing, filled in the missing links with conjecture, and decided that there was indeed a conspiracy afoot. Many historians have been prone to accept Washington’s views on the matter, believing that inconsistencies could be explained by the conspirators’ own circumspection once they had been exposed. The scheme to replace Washington was supposedly engineered by a group of army

80 | Conway Cabal

officers, including Gates, Mifflin, and Conway, as well as Congressmen John Adams, Samuel Adams, Richard Henry Lee, and James Lovell. The physician Benjamin Rush was also believed to be involved. Gates himself supposedly played no active part in the conspiracy; in fact, he was considered to be little more than a willing tool of the more astute plotters. These men and others who were sometimes mentioned were said to have realized that Washington was still in good standing with most congressmen, despite his military reverses and his propensity to retreat before a powerful enemy. Therefore, they would have to use subterfuge to compel Washington to resign. This meant deceiving Congress into voting for anti-Washington measures by touting them as being good for the war effort. First, Congress had to be manipulated into reorganizing the Board of War and appointing Gates the new chairman so that the board could be used as an instrument by the plotters. The reorganization was accomplished on November 27, 1777. Second, the board would have to propose army reforms and a plan to invade Canada, command of which would be given to Major General Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, a young French officer, to lure him into their clutches. Once Washington was confronted with these faits accomplis, he would have to bow to the will of Gates, the new chairman of the Board of War, or resign. If Washington acquiesced to any of the board’s schemes, that body would have gained control of the war effort. If he resigned, Gates would take his place and hopefully prove to be a more competent commander in chief. The intricacy and unreality of these supposed plans make their existence suspect. To believe that the conspirators could work together in such harmony in the chaotic

winter of 1777–1778 shows little recognition of the difficulties they would have faced. To believe that sensible congressmen, most of them devoted to Washington, could be duped so easily defies common sense. Also, the correspondence of the supposed conspirators should show some evidence that the convoluted scheme was afoot, which it does not. Finally, Gates’s actions as chairman of the Board of War do not point to an organized plan to embarrass Washington. The commander in chief’s own statements about the proof of the cabal must not be taken at face value. Giving due weight to his difficulties at Valley Forge, he could have been distorting the evidence, perhaps even deliberately, to bolster his political position with antimilitary congressmen. At the very least, his pronouncements should be measured against the words of other participants with other perspectives. It is true that Washington’s performance as a general was being discussed by some congressmen in late 1777. There were major civil-military tensions at that time, and Washington’s performance was criticized by some small-government members, but only in private conversations. All the discussion, though critical of Washington, showed no desire to replace him, and no such proposal was ever presented on the floor of Congress. In fact, congressmen seemed inclined not to criticize Washington publicly, believing that he was crucial to the war effort. Nor were their criticisms out of place, for Congress was, after all, a deliberative body that had to work for the common good. Some small-government congressmen, it is true, were a little disturbed by the adulation of Washington expressed by army officers. Against these tendencies, Congress believed that it must assert its civilian authority or risk an imbalance of power



weighted toward the military. Rush, the medical director of the Middle Department, was also particularly critical of Washington in his private correspondence. Clearly, he would have welcomed a movement to replace Washington, but there is no evidence that Rush had any confederates. Gates’s correspondence and that of his supposed coconspirators shows no evidence of any desire to supplant Washington. Unaware of Washington’s suspicions, Gates replied to Conway’s much-discussed letter on December 3 and clearly stated his sympathy for Washington’s difficult situation. When Gates received Mifflin’s letter a day later, he responded by wondering who was tattling about confidential correspondence, but he showed no concern about being “exposed” as a conspirator. He initiated an exchange of letters with Washington on December 8, and while Gates was unapologetic in his comments, he certainly showed no desire to backpedal from a conspiratorial position. Washington, in response, was scathing and sarcastic, and Gates realized by February 9 that Washington, whether for political or other reasons, was not being rational on the subject. On February 19, Gates wrote to Washington solemnly disavowing any part in any scheme against the commander in chief. On February 24, Washington wrote to Gates that the matter would henceforth be buried in silence and oblivion. But on February 28, Washington wrote to John Fitzgerald that Gates had involved himself in absurd contradictions in his letters. In a letter to Patrick Henry on the same day, Washington declared that a conspiracy existed against him, although he could not mark its precise extent. He did, however, specifically implicate Gates, Mifflin, and Conway, asserting that he had absolute proof of their complicity. Washington never made these proofs a

Conway Cabal | 81

part of the public record. In fact, he had involved himself in absurd contradictions in his inflammatory letter to Henry. As for Gates’s correspondence with Washington, it contained “no contradictions, ‘absurd’ or otherwise.” While this war of words was going on, Congress was supposedly playing its part in the conspiracy by enacting measures to embarrass Washington. The reorganization of the Board of War was supposedly the first step, although in actual fact Congress was merely responding to a widely perceived need for reforms. Washington himself was an advocate of reforming the board but would not have made Gates its chairman. Also, the promotion of Conway to major general by Congress on December 14, 1777, and his appointment to the office of inspector general of the army were seen as calculated insults to Washington. Again, the facts indicate otherwise. Congress promoted Conway because the members believed that he deserved the new rank, and they did so before they were aware of Washington’s hostility toward him. Also, Congress appointed Gates, Mifflin, and Timothy Pickering on January 10, 1778, to a committee of conference to meet with Washington at Valley Forge to discuss military problems. Gates demurred from this service, and Congress excused all three from the duty because Washington was so hostile by this time. Believers in the cabal were also convinced that Gates and the Board of War planned an invasion of Canada in early 1778, with the ostensible purpose of luring Lafayette away from Washington and embarrassing the commander in chief. Again, the facts indicate otherwise. When Gates had served in the Northern Department the previous year, he had become convinced that a winter campaign against

82 | Cornwallis, Charles, 1st Marquess

Canada would bring good results. Congress and Washington were also interested. On January 22, Congress voted to approve the invasion while leaving the planning to the Board of War. The next day, Congress appointed Lafayette to command the expedition and Conway to be his second-incommand because they both spoke French. Initially, Lafayette was enthusiastic about the new command, but after talking to Washington, he angrily chastised the board for its supposed machinations against the commander in chief. After Lafayette had procrastinated for weeks in organizing the expedition, Congress finally realized that it was not feasible. On March 2, the invasion of Canada was canceled, supposedly by a chastened Congress that finally came to recognize the venture’s true purpose. Thereafter, the alleged Conway Cabal sputtered to an ignominious conclusion. By March, it was clear to Washington and his supporters that his position as commander in chief was secure, and everyone at headquarters relaxed a bit. Congressmen such as Jonathan Bayard Smith and Eliphalet Dyer passionately asserted in February and March that there was never the least intention in Congress to remove Washington. Hence, the small-government congressmen were thoroughly routed in their attempts to assert civilian authority. Conway, in a fit of disgust, submitted his resignation to Congress on April 28, even though he did not intend to leave the army. To his surprise, his resignation was immediately accepted. He asked Gates in a number of letters to intervene in the matter but did not even receive a reply. On July 4, offended at Conway’s criticism of Washington, Brigadier General John Cadwalader of the Pennsylvania Militia seriously wounded Conway in a duel. Believing himself near death, Conway

wrote Washington a contrite letter of apology for having done, written, or said anything disagreeable to the commander in chief. Conway survived the wound, returned to France, and served there as a capable officer. Relations between Washington and Gates were permanently soured. The former remained convinced (or so he said) that he had been the victim of a plot. The latter believed, with some justification, that he had been used by Washington for political purposes. One point was clear, despite Washington’s claim to the contrary: the evidence of a conspiracy was almost totally lacking. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Higginbotham, Don. The War of American Independence: Military Attitudes, Policies, and Practice, 1763–1789. New York: Macmillan, 1971. Knollenberg, Bernhard. Washington and the Revolution, a Reappraisal: Gates, Conway, and the Continental Congress. New York: Macmillan, 1941. Nelson, Paul David. General Horatio Gates: A Biography. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1976. Nelson, Paul David. William Alexander, Lord Stirling. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1987. Rossie, Jonathan Gregory. The Politics of Command in the American Revolution. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1975.

Cornwallis, Charles, 1st Marquess(1738–1805) Born in Grosvenor Square, London, on October 31, 1738, Charles Cornwallis was the eldest son of the 1st Earl Cornwallis. In



time, he would become the 2nd Earl and 1st Marquess of Cornwallis. He was educated at Eton and joined the British Army on December 8, 1756, as an ensign in the Grenadier Guards. Unlike many of his fellow officers, who were military amateurs, Cornwallis seriously studied military science and excelled as a professional officer. He served with British forces in Hanover during the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), and as a captain of the 85th Regiment of Foot, he took part in the Battle of Minden (August 1, 1759). He returned with his regiment to England and was elected to the House of Commons in 1760. In the following year, he fought in several battles in Germany. In 1762, upon the death of his father, Cornwallis inherited the earldom and assumed his seat in the House of Lords. Appointed aide-de-camp to King George III in August 1765, Cornwallis was advanced to colonel of the 33rd Regiment of Foot in March 1766. He was also made constable of the Tower of London and appointed to other political posts. When the American War of Independence began, Cornwallis did not think it was a struggle the British could win, but he was ready to give it his best effort. Stationed in Ireland with his regiment and offered a major generalcy in 1775 to go to America, he accepted and sailed on February 12, 1776. In command of seven regiments, he participated in the unsuccessful British assault on Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina (June 16–July 25, 1776). As a military officer, Cornwallis was well regarded by his peers for his martial abilities, his genuine concern for his men, and his lack of disciplinary rigidity. Aggressive in battle, he much preferred offensive to defensive operations. His chief military failing was his tendency to lose interest or become distracted in a prolonged operation.

Cornwallis, Charles, 1st Marquess | 83

Cornwallis next fought under General Sir William Howe, the British commander in chief in America, during the latter’s New York campaign. He distinguished himself in the battles at Kips Bay (September 15); White Plains (October 28), where he commanded the British right wing; Fort Washington (November 14–15); and Fort Lee, New Jersey (November 20, 1776). He commanded the British outpost forces in New Jersey that were defeated by General George Washington’s Continental Army at Trenton (December 26, 1776) and Princeton (January 3, 1777). Cornwallis was in New York when he learned of Washington’s attack on Trenton. He moved rapidly against Washington, gathering troops as he proceeded. Having collected 8,000 men and believing that he had trapped Washington, who commanded only 6,000 men, against the Delaware River on the night of January 2, he decided not to attack until morning. His hesitation allowed Washington to escape and win the Battle of Princeton the following day. Cornwallis was one of the few senior British generals to support Howe’s decision to capture Philadelphia. In that campaign, Cornwallis commanded the flanking main British attack in the British victory in the Battle of Brandywine (September 11, 1777). He received the honor of leading the British forces into Philadelphia. In November, he took command of the British troops who captured Forts Mifflin and Mercer on the Delaware River. Granted leave to return to Britain to visit his family and handle official matters, Cornwallis sailed home in December 1777. He returned to America in April 1778 as a lieutenant general and second-in-command under Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton, the new British commander in North America, with whom he would have sharp

84 | Cornwallis, Charles, 1st Marquess

disagreements. Cornwallis took part in the Battle of Monmouth (June 28, 1778), but in November, he sailed for Britain to be with his dying wife, to whom he was devoted. Although he had intended to resign his commission, her death caused him to change his mind and return to America. Cornwallis enthusiastically supported Clinton’s subsequent southern strategy and played a key role in it. Following the successful British siege and capture of Charles Town (March 29–May 12, 1780), Clinton returned to New York, leaving Cornwallis in command in the South. Cornwallis busied himself with administrative matters in Charles Town until August, when he hurried to Camden, South Carolina, to meet an American army moving south under Major General Horatio Gates. In the Battle of Camden (August 16, 1780), Cornwallis soundly defeated Gates at Camden, but British defeats sustained by Cornwallis’s subordinates at Kings Mountain (October 7, 1780) and Cowpens (January 17, 1781) greatly reduced his strength. Although he defeated Major General Nathanael Greene’s Continentals in the Battle of Guilford Courthouse, North Carolina, on March 15, 1781, his victory came at the cost of casualties amounting to a quarter of his force. Deciding to march north into Virginia in an effort to choke off Patriot supplies being sent southward, Cornwallis assumed command of British forces there. He accomplished much, mounting his infantry on seized horses and practicing a highly successful scorched-earth policy. But when Sir Henry Clinton ordered him to withdraw to the coast, Cornwallis marched his army to the tobacco port of Yorktown. He was safe there as long as the British controlled Chesapeake Bay and he could be resupplied by water.

But on September 5, 1781, Cornwallis’s army was cut off by a powerful French fleet under Admiral François-Joseph-Paul, comte de Grasse-Tilly, that defeated a British fleet in the Battle of the Chesapeake (Battle of the Capes). Continental Army and French forces under General George Washington and Lieutenant General Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau, then laid siege to Yorktown from the land side, forcing Cornwallis to surrender his army on October 19. Cornwallis claimed illness and did not attend the surrender ceremony. News of the surrender at Yorktown brought down the British government and, for all intents and purposes, ended the war. Cornwallis went to New York City on parole and was exchanged in May 1782 for Henry Laurens. Cornwallis blamed the Royal Navy and Clinton for the Yorktown defeat. Cornwallis sailed for England in January 1783. Received as a hero, he was never censured for the Yorktown surrender. Cornwallis went on to be a highly effective and fair-minded reformist governorgeneral of India during 1786–1793. He commanded British forces in person in the Third Anglo-Mysore War (1790–1792), taking Bangalore and forcing Tipu Sahib (Tipu Sultan) to surrender on March 16, 1792, following the siege of Seringapatan. Cornwallis was created the 1st Marquess Cornwallis in 1793. Cornwallis was commander in chief in Ireland during 1798–1801 and put down the rebellion of 1798 in connection with a French invasion attempt. He treated the Irish leniently and resigned in 1801 when King George III refused to grant Catholic emancipation. He returned to India as governor-general in 1805. Cornwallis died in Ghazipur on October 5, 1805. A brave and capable general, he had



been far more effective as a field commander than as a strategist. His greatest talents had been in administration, where he was highly effective. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Buchanan, John. The Road to Guilford Courthouse. New York: Wiley, 1997. Wickwire, Francis, and Mary Wickwire. Cornwallis: The American Adventure. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1970. Wickwire, Francis, and Mary Wickwire. Cornwallis: The Imperial Years. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1980. Willcox, William. Portrait of a General: Sir Henry Clinton in the War of Independence. New York: Knopf, 1964.

Cowpens, Battle of (January 17, 1781) Known as the “American Cannae,” the Battle of Cowpens on January 17, 1781, is regarded as a minor tactical masterpiece. On December 16, 1781, the new commander of Continental Army forces in the South, Major General Nathanael Greene, made the difficult decision to divide his army. This was in large part prompted by logistical considerations, for dividing the army would ease supply difficulties, but the plan violated basic military principles that called for an army to concentrate against a stronger foe. Dividing the army appeared to allow the British the opportunity to destroy it piecemeal, for the two major parts of the army, under Greene and Brigadier General Daniel Morgan, would be too far apart to be mutually supporting. Before moving his headquarters from Charlotte, North Carolina, to the Cheraw

Cowpens, Battle of | 85

Highlands with 1,100 men, Greene dispatched some 300 of his best troops under Morgan along with able cavalryman Lieutenant Colonel William Washington’s Continental Light Dragoons—some 600 men in all—to the southwest to take up a position on the Pacolet River in western South Carolina. This move would place them on the left flank of British forces under Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis. Morgan’s position was some 140 miles from that of Greene. In his new camp, Morgan was joined by 300 volunteers and up to 400 South Carolina and Georgia militiamen and was in position to threaten British posts at both Ninety Six and Augusta. Greene expected Morgan to shore up Patriot morale in the western country of South Carolina but did not believe that Morgan was strong enough to accomplish much offensively, noting that Morgan’s men were simply too few in number to make any “opposition of consequence.” Greene’s moves had the effect of forcing Cornwallis to follow suit, for if the British concentrated for an attack on Greene, this would enable Morgan to move against and take Ninety Six, Augusta, or both. Meanwhile, British mounted forces successfully employed irregular tactics and achieved tactical mobility equal or superior to that of the Continental forces. Twenty-six-year-old Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton, known as the “Hunting Leopard,” became the leading figure of the new highly mobile British irregular warfare in the South. Tarleton’s British Legion (known as the Green Dragoons for their green uniforms) was a highly effective unit. At the same time, the arrival in the South of 1,500 British reinforcements under Major General Alexander Leslie enabled Cornwallis, in any case displeased with the

86 | Cowpens, Battle of

results of his dispersion tactics, to carry out offensive operations. He decided that his first target of the now divided Continentals would be Morgan. In early January 1781, Cornwallis dispatched Tarleton, his crack legion, and other units totaling some 1,100 men to defeat or disperse the American force. Once that had been accomplished, Cornwallis planned to move against Greene. Tarleton, confident of an easy success, eagerly accepted the assignment. After all, he was facing only some 600 poorly equipped Continentals and several hundred militia. Greene and Morgan both had excellent intelligence as to the British moves and were well aware that Tarleton was about to “pay a visit.” Morgan made what preparations he could, preparing a defensive position at a place known as Cowpens, located near the North Carolina border and south of the Broad River. Cowpens was so named because it had been used for many years for grazing cattle. The Battle of Cowpens occurred on the morning of January 17, 1781. Most accounts state that both sides were approximately equal in number, although recent research by Lawrence E. Babits indicates that additional militia reinforcements may have given the Americans a significant numerical advantage. Counting militia, Morgan later reported that he had about 1,050 men (Babits believes the true figure to be at least twice that) to Tarleton’s 1,100. Knowing of Tarleton’s approach, Morgan selected a hill as the center of his position and arranged his forces so as to take advantage of their strengths while at the same time concealing their weaknesses. The defenders were in three lines: riflemen in front, then militia, and finally the Continentals. Morgan ordered his riflemen to fire two rounds—with their preferred targets the

British officers—and then move to the rear as a reserve. The militiamen were to wait until the British were at point-blank range, then fire a volley and in turn move to the rear. Finally, there was the Continental Line, which would meet the British on the hill’s crest, if need be with the bayonet. Morgan concealed Colonel Washington’s cavalry, augmented by mounted militia, behind the hill. On locating Morgan, the impetuous and overconfident Tarleton committed a major mistake, eschewing a reconnaissance in favor of an immediate attack. He then took the withdrawal of the first two Patriot ranks as the beginning of a rout. When Tarleton’s men rushed the final rank of the Continental Line, Morgan ordered the cavalry to attack Tarleton’s right flank. At the same time, the militia—now having reformed—struck the British left. In this small-scale repeat of the Battle of Cannae of 216 BCE, Tarleton lost 90 percent of his force. He himself escaped along with some of his cavalry, but Tarleton left behind on the field 100 dead, 229 wounded, and 600 unwounded prisoners. Morgan reported his losses as 12 killed and 60 wounded. More important for Morgan, he secured some 800 muskets, 2 cannon, 100 horses, and all the British supplies and ammunition. Soon the British prisoners were headed north, guarded by Virginia militiamen whose terms of enlistment had expired. The Battle of Cowpens was a major disaster for the British. It completely transformed the situation in the South, which had seemed so close to a Patriot disaster just weeks before. Patriot morale soared. But Morgan had in fact taken a considerable gamble, and his decision to fight was probably a mistaken one, although fortunately for the Patriot cause it had a glorious outcome.

Cowpens, Battle of | 87



Greene feared that this one victory might serve to convince those in the North that the South no longer needed supplies and aid. He knew that the war in the South was far from over. Morgan was in fact now in serious danger. Soon he was in retreat, pursued by Cornwallis. Greene joined Morgan and, in another tactical masterpiece, managed to keep the Southern Army just ahead of the pursing British and lead it all the way north to cross the Dan River and reach safety in Virginia. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Babits, Lawrence E. A Devil of a Whipping: The Battle of Cowpens. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1998. Buchanan, John. The Road to Guilford Courthouse: The American Revolution in the Carolinas. New York: Wiley, 1997. Edgar, Walter B. Partisans and Redcoats: The American Revolution in the South Carolina Backcountry. New York: Morrow, 2001. Fleming, Thomas J. “Downright Fighting”: The Story of Cowpens. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Interior, 1988.

D Dan River, Race to the(January 18–February 15, 1781)

crossed. The river was swollen as a result of the rains, and Cornwallis had no option but to pitch camp and wait for the water to recede. Greene meanwhile decided that he had to reunite his own larger portion of the army at Cheraw Hills, South Carolina, with that of Morgan and withdraw the combined forces north across the Dan River into Virginia, where his own supply lines would be shorter and those of Cornwallis considerably longer. Greene would then wait for the right moment to turn and strike the British. Greene ordered his own part of the army, some 1,100 men, commanded in his absence by Brigadier General Isaac Huger, to march from the Pee Dee River toward Salisbury, North Carolina, near the Yadkin River. Getting Morgan’s force to safety was a priority, and with Morgan now in poor health, Greene decided to take command in person. At great risk, he rode to Morgan through a heavily Loyalist area accompanied by only an aide, narrowly escaping capture by British cavalry. Greene had already issued orders to collect all the boats along the Dan River so they might be ready to ferry the army across. Greene reached Morgan’s camp on the Catawba on January 30, the same day that Cornwallis was making camp on the other side of the river. Hoping he could contest the British crossing of the Catawba, Greene called out the local militia; however, the turnout was disappointing, and the river receded too quickly. Greene then ordered Morgan to fall back on Salisbury.

The race to the Dan River was an epic effort by troops under British commander in the South lieutenant general Lord Charles Cornwallis to try to catch and destroy the Continental Army in the South commanded by Major General Nathanael Greene, which was moving north through North Carolina in an effort to cross the Dan River and reach safety in Virginia. On January 17, 1781, at a place known as the Cowpens, just south of the Broad River in Cherokee County near Chesnee, South Carolina, Continental Army brigadier general Daniel Morgan with the smaller portion of Greene’s army and a numerous force of militiamen had largely destroyed Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton’s British detachment. Bent on releasing the British prisoners and destroying Morgan, Cornwallis, who had recently been reinforced, began pursuing Morgan with some 3,000 men. Morgan was already withdrawing northward. On January 25, at Ramsur’s Mill, North Carolina, Cornwallis halted for two days. Having lost his light infantry in the Battle of Cowpens and taken three days to cover just 30 miles, Cornwallis took the drastic step of converting his entire force to light infantry by burning most of his wagons and excess baggage. Cornwallis started out again on January 27, now moving much faster. Both forces also had to contend with steady rain and deep mud. But when Cornwallis reached the Catawba River on January 30, he learned that Morgan had already 89

90 | Dan River, Race to the

Cornwallis decided to try to cross the Catawba on the night of January 31– February 1, Morgan having crossed on January 30. The river line was held by a rear guard of North Carolina militia under Brigadier General William Davidson, who posted some 800 men to cover four likely crossing points along 30 miles of the river. The largest number, some 300 men, were at Beattie’s Ford, just south of Morgan’s camp. Cornwallis ordered a demonstration against Beattie’s Ford but attempted to outflank the Americans by crossing the bulk of his men at Cowan’s (or McCowan’s) Ford, six miles below, just before dawn on February 1. The British made it across and engaged the militiamen there. Davidson was shot and killed while trying to organize his men, and the militia then scattered. Cornwallis then moved against Morgan’s encampment, only to find it deserted. Morgan’s men reached the Yadkin River on February 2. That river was also high. Boats were there as ordered, but the crossing was slowed by a number of Patriot townspeople from Salisbury who insisted on fleeing with the army. Most of Morgan’s men and the townspeople had crossed the river before Cornwallis’s advance guard arrived on the morning of February 3, however. With his own troops unable to reach Salisbury in time, Greene changed the assembly point to the small town of Guilford Courthouse, between the Dan and Haw Rivers. On February 8, Greene and Morgan broke camp and headed for Guilford Courthouse, where the two wings of Greene’s army merged on February 9. Greene briefly considered giving battle to Cornwallis. The terrain favored the Americans, but the absence of significant numbers of militia decided the issue. Greene had only 2,036 men, with 1,426 of these regulars and most

newly enlisted, while Cornwallis had perhaps twice Greene’s strength in regulars. Greene had no other realistic option but to continue the withdrawal into Virginia, where he expected to be resupplied and reinforced. On February 10, Morgan, now in very poor health and granted a leave of absence by Greene, returned to his home in Virginia. Colonel Otho Williams assumed Morgan’s command. Greene now had to make haste if his forces were to beat the British to the Dan. On February 10, the British were only 35 miles distant and closing fast. Greene sent his wagons and all unnecessary equipment on ahead. Unknown to Cornwallis, Greene had already ordered the collection of boats on the Dan, but even with these, it would take some time to get all the men across. To escape the British with his army intact, it was essential to create a diversion to deceive Cornwallis as to the actual crossing point. Greene therefore divided his force, creating a handpicked 700-man light corps under Williams to act as the army’s rear guard and harass the British. The rear guard included all of Greene’s cavalry under Lieutenant Colonel Henry “Light-Horse Harry” Lee. The final leg of the race to the Dan began on February 10. British scouts reported to Cornwallis the presence of a large number of Continentals ahead, presumably heading for the Dan. This was Greene’s rear guard, but because of its size, Cornwallis assumed it to be the entire Continental force and set out after it. This belief was strengthened by the fact that the force appeared to be making for the fords on the narrower upper Dan, where Cornwallis assumed Greene would seek to cross. Greene, however, had arranged for the boats to be waiting for the army farther downstream, at Irwin’s Ferry. During the next several days, Cornwallis strained to catch up, moving as much as



30 miles a day, which was amazing given the state of the roads. Gradually, Williams drew Cornwallis off to the west until his men and Greene’s own column with the bulk of the troops were moving north on parallel tracks, not widely separated. Tight security was essential, for if Cornwallis discovered the ruse, he could possibly defeat the two American columns in detail. On February 12, Tarleton, eager to engage the Americans, pushed forward. His men clashed with Lee in a short, sharp cavalry encounter before Tarleton broke it off, having lost 18 men killed to only 2 for Lee. On February 13–14, Greene got his own men and wagons across the Dan. Williams then won the last leg of the race with Cornwallis, covering the remaining 40 miles in only 16 hours and getting all of his men across by the time Cornwallis, having taken 24 hours to march the same distance, had arrived. Cornwallis, lacking both boats and engineers, now gave up the chase. The British army controlled the Carolinas, but its long lines of communication to interior posts were also vulnerable to guerrilla attack. The 200-mile Continental Army march from Cowpens, which included the crossing of four rivers, is regarded as a minor military masterpiece and one of the great retreats in American military history. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Alderman, Clifford Lindsey. Retreat to Victory: The Life of Nathanael Greene. Philadelphia: Chilton Books, 1967. Golway, Terry. Washington’s General: Nathanael Greene and the Triumph of the American Revolution. New York: Henry Holt, 2005. Tucker, Spencer C. Rise and Fight Again: The Life of General Nathanael Greene. Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2009.

Declaration of Independence | 91

Declaration of Independence (July 4, 1776) The Declaration of Independence, which was formally adopted on July 4, 1776, is one of the most important documents in U.S. history. Its genesis can largely be traced to developments that began at the end of the French and Indian War (1754–1763). After that conflict, the British Parliament ended its previous policy of salutary neglect of the American colonies and attempted to tax them to help pay for the expenses it had incurred during the war. The colonists cited the principle of “no taxation without representation,” which they traced to the Magna Carta of 1215, to question the right of Parliament, in which they were not physically represented, to tax them. By contrast, the British insisted that Parliament represented all Englishmen (thus virtually representing colonists as well) and that it could exercise absolute sovereignty in North America as well as in Britain. Long after many colonists had begun to question the power of Parliament, they continued to recognize their attachment to Britain through the king, who had issued many of the charters for the colonies and whom most recognized as having the right to direct foreign affairs for the entire British Empire. Even after fighting broke out between the British and the Americans at Lexington and Concord on April 15, 1775, the colonists continued to petition the king for redress of grievances. These petitions were ignored, and by that time, the colonists were ready for independence. They had become well schooled in Thomas Paine’s thinking manifested in the pamphlet Common Sense, published in January 1776. In this document, Paine linked the British monarchy to oppression and war and questioned the institution of hereditary succession.

92 | Declaration of Independence

On June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia proposed three resolutions in the Second Continental Congress, which was then meeting in Philadelphia to express colonial views in the emerging conflict with Great Britain. One of Lee’s resolutions called for independence from Britain, another for obtaining foreign allies, and a third for drawing up a new form of government. Congress appointed a committee of five to draft a document declaring the colonies’ independence: Thomas Jefferson from Virginia, John Adams from Massachusetts, Benjamin Franklin from Pennsylvania, Robert R. Livingston from New York, and Roger Sherman from Connecticut. Jefferson authored the first draft of the document. Adams and Franklin made some stylistic changes, and Congress extensively debated and revised the document. On July 2, Congress voted to adopt Lee’s resolution for independence and then, on July 4, voted to adopt the Declaration of Independence as a written justification of its actions. The signing took place over a period of months. The beauty of the Declaration of Independence is that it positioned colonial grievances against Britain within a larger philosophical perspective that has since served as a kind of national creed. The first paragraph of the declaration was written to explain why the colonists were declaring their independence from Great Britain, which they had previously considered their mother country. In appealing to a wide audience in the Declaration of Independence, the colonists recast familiar rights that they claimed as Englishmen into more universal human, or natural, rights. The second paragraph of the declaration thus serves not only as an introduction to American grievances but also as a philosophy of the purposes of government.

This philosophy is often associated with the British philosopher John Locke and other social contract thinkers, although it may also reflect the influence of Scottish philosophy and other contemporaries. Locke had hypothesized that if humans were confronted with a state of nature without government, their lives, liberties, and property would be in jeopardy, and they would join together in a social compact, or government, to protect them. The declaration argues that “all men”—a term that, under usage of the day, was probably intended to include both white males and females—“are created equal,” an equality that the declaration traces to their creation by God. The equality that Jefferson articulated was not an equality of talents, wealth, or incomes but rather an equal entitlement to the basic rights of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Consistent with Locke’s philosophy that opposed the divine right of kings, Jefferson believed that when governments fail to secure such rights, the people have the right to replace them with governments that will. As a lawyer, Jefferson composed the Declaration of Independence much like a legal brief. The central part of the document contains a list of about 25 accusations of the British government’s abuses, including its failure to accept needed laws, the suspension and dissolution of colonial legislatures, denials of due process, and war atrocities, which Jefferson argued evidenced the desire of this government to rule despotically. Most accusations begin with the words “He has,” in reference to King George III. When Jefferson indicated that “He has combined with others,” he was indirectly referring to Parliament (hence Jefferson’s further reference to “Acts of pretended legislation”), whose authority the colonists had already rejected. Toward the end of his accusations,

Declaratory Act | 93



Jefferson further noted the outbreak of conflict and the colonists’ vain appeals to the British people for relief. Incorporating Lee’s earlier resolution for independence toward the end of the document, the 56 signatories from the 13 colonies ended in a mutual pledge of their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor. The signatories recognized that the British would consider their action to be treason. One of Jefferson’s charges against George III, which the Second Continental Congress significantly shortened to “He has excited domestic insurrections among us,” was a long section accusing the king of introducing and perpetuating slavery within the colonies. Southerners were particularly anxious to downplay an accusation that, by recognizing the injustice of the institution, might give slaves a justification to assert their own equality. As a slave owner, Jefferson would later lament that he had no solution to the problem. Significantly, abolitionist and former slave Frederick Douglass gave a speech on Independence Day in 1852 explaining how the nation had failed to live up to the proclamation of equality in the Declaration of Independence. A decade later, President Abraham Lincoln called on the nation during the American Civil War to realize the promise of the declaration by recognizing the equal rights of all men. The eventual result was the adoption of the Thirteenth Amendment (1865), which eliminated slavery, and the Fourteenth Amendment (1868), which recognized the citizenship of all persons born or naturalized in the United States and guaranteed them all equal protection. In the twentieth century, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was among those who argued that racial segregation continued to mock the equality that the

declaration had promised, and he cited its natural rights philosophy in justifying his own willingness to go to jail to combat unjust laws. With the passage of time, the Declaration of Independence ceased to be a purely American document. It has inspired advocates of equality of opportunity, liberty, and accountable government throughout the world. John R. Vile

Further Reading Armitage, David. The Declaration of Independence: A Global History. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007. Becker, Carl L. The Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Political Ideas. New York: Vintage Books, 1970. Maier, Pauline. American Scripture: Making the Declaration of Independence. New York: Vintage, 1998. Vile, John R. A Companion to the United States Constitution and Its Amendments. 5th ed. Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2010.

Declaratory Act(March 18, 1766) The Declaratory Act was legislation passed by the British Parliament on March 18, 1766, that asserted parliamentary authority and prerogative over the American colonies “in all cases whatsoever.” Also known as the American Colonies Act of 1766, the Declaratory Act was introduced in Parliament by Prime Minister Charles Watson-Wentworth, 2nd Marquis of Rockingham, and applied to Britain’s North American colonies as well as those in the British West Indies. The immediate catalyst for the act was the Stamp Act of 1765, which had greatly angered many American colonists and had resulted in

94 | Declaratory Act

boycotts of British goods. The economic dislocations caused by the Stamp Act had hurt British merchants, who complained loudly to Parliament and also threatened to prolong Britain’s deep economic recession, a result of the long and costly French and Indian War of 1754–1763. The wording of the Declaratory Act was directly modeled on an earlier parliamentary action aimed at Ireland, known as the Irish Declaratory Act. That action had placed the Irish under the absolute authority of Parliament and the British Crown. Concerned about the economic effects of the Stamp Act Congress’s boycott in North America, Parliament agreed to repeal the Stamp Act, but it was at the same time determined to demonstrate its complete sovereignty over its colonies. Thus, Parliament repealed the Stamp Act on the same day that it enacted the Declaratory Act. Among other things, the Declaratory Act established that the colonies “have been, are, and of right ought to be, subordinate unto, and dependent upon the imperial Crown and Parliament of Great Britain.” Additionally, it stipulated that any colonial resolution or action challenging this prerogative would be declared “utterly null and void.” Finally, the act stated unambiguously that Parliament retained the absolute power to enact laws in the colonies “in all cases whatsoever.” This authority was asserted even though the colonists had no direct representation in Parliament, a point that would become a major bone of contention in British-colonial relations. Parliament believed that its declaration also included the absolute right to further taxation. However, many colonists who rejoiced over the repeal of the Stamp Act seemed not to fully comprehend the

expansive nature of the Declaratory Act. They thought that by repealing the Stamp Act, Parliament was tacitly implying that it could not levy direct taxes on the colonies if they were not represented in Parliament. This notion was laid to rest with the Townshend Acts of 1767, which caused even more of an uproar in the colonies. In February 1775, on the eve of the American Revolutionary War, Benjamin Franklin asserted that reconciliation with the Crown could only be achieved, first and foremost, with the annulment of the Declaratory Act. On July 6, 1775, the Second Continental Congress, in its Declaration on the Causes and Necessities of Taking Up Arms, specifically mentioned the Declaratory Act as one of the motivating factors for the rebellion. Two years into the war, in 1778, the British government offered negotiations with its rebellious colonists to end the war and permit the colonies to remain in the British fold. Among other things, the negotiators were given the authority to suggest a repeal of the Declaratory Act. The offer came too late, for the colonists were far too invested in the conflict to seek a negotiated settlement. The issue of national power and taxation authority spilled over into American blueprints for the government under the Articles of Confederation, which was notoriously weak and did not have any power to raise revenue; it was eventually scrapped for a new system under the Constitution of 1787. Even under the new arrangement, the national government would not exercise complete authority over the states. Interestingly, the Declaratory Act remained on the books until 1964, when it was finally repealed. By then, most of Britain’s imperial holdings



throughout the world had become semiautonomous or independent. Paul G. Pierpaoli Jr.

Declaratory Act | 95 Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982.

Further Reading

Reis, John Phillip. Constitutional History of the American Revolution. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1995.

Rakove, Jack N. The Beginnings of National Politics: An Interpretive History of the Continental Congress. 1979. Reprint,

Thomas, P. D. G. British Politics and the Stamp Act Crisis: The First Phase of the American Revolution. Oxford, UK: Clarendon, 1975.

F Flintlock Musket

of the frizzen (an L-shaped piece of steel also known as the steel or the battery), throwing it back to expose the small amount of black powder in the pan. The flint scraping the steel caused a shower of sparks to be thrown into the pan, igniting the black powder and sending fire through the touch hole, igniting the main charge of black powder in the breech of the barrel, and propelling the ball down and out of the barrel. While in its normal upright position before the firing sequence began, the frizzen kept the charge in the powder pan dry and also prevented it from falling out of the pan. (The phrase “flash in the pan,” where there is a sign of something and yet not the desired result, comes from a misfire, where there would only be a flash.) A well-trained soldier could fire three or perhaps four shots a minute from his flintlock. Even so, the flintlock musket was a highly inaccurate and rather unreliable weapon. On average, a misfire could be expected every 9–10 shots and a hang fire every 18–20 shots. The flint had to be changed every 30 shots or so. The soft lead bullet moved at a relatively low velocity and had great knockdown power. As soon as it struck any resistant object, such as human flesh, it began to spread, creating frightful wounds. Because this so often removed chunks of bone, amputations remained a common occurrence, and these were often fatal. The main drawback to the flintlock was its lack of accuracy. Its great windage (the difference between the diameter of the bore and the diameter of the ball being fired)

The smoothbore flintlock musket was the basic individual firearm of both soldiers and militia during the American Revolutionary War. Flintlocks were long-barreled, muzzleloading firearms that fired a round ball. The term flintlock refers to the method of igniting the powder charge. The word musket is from the Spanish term for the firearm, mosquete. In general use, from the early eighteenth century, the flintlock musket replaced the earlier matchlock, wheel lock, and snaplock. The flintlock was basically an improved snaplock. The snaplock employed flint and steel in firing for the first time. In the snaplock, pulling the trigger opened the pan cover as the cock swung forward, scraping the flint against the face of a piece of upright steel, pushing it forward and causing sparks to fall in the exposed pan below. The flintlock was a refinement of the snaplock, in which the steel and pan cover were of one piece. Flintlock firing followed this procedure: putting the musket on half cock (putting the weapon on safety, which originated the phrase “Don’t go off half-cocked,” meaning unable to operate); taking out the cartridge and biting off the paper at the top; pouring a small bit of powder into the pan; ramming the remaining powder, paper, and ball down the bore; putting the musket on full cock; and pulling the trigger to fire the weapon. This caused the hammer, or cock, which held a shaped flint in its jaws, to move sharply forward and scrape down the face 97

98 | Flintlock Musket

meant that such weapons were inherently inaccurate. Soldiers using flintlock muskets could not reliably hit a man-size target much beyond 80 yards. Substantial windage was necessary because of the slightly irregular bullet and the considerable buildup of residue in the barrel from the burning of black powder. As a result, the bullet actually bounded down the bore (balloting) and might take flight from the muzzle of the weapon at an undesired angle. This inaccuracy in fire meant that most battles between infantry took place at near dueling pistol range. In firing tactics, commanders sought to mass as many muskets as possible in a short length of firing line, expecting that the sure volume of fire would overcome inaccuracy. The result could be frightful numbers of casualties. The standard military flintlocks of the American Revolution were the British Brown Bess and the French Charleville. During the reign of Queen Anne (1702–1714), the British Army officially adopted a standardized shoulder weapon, the so-called Brown Bess. Perhaps the most famous flintlock musket of the colonial era, it may have taken its name from “browning,” the process whereby the iron barrel was treated. “Bess” may have been a corruption of the German word Büsche, meaning “gun,” or it may have simply been a soldier’s nickname. The Brown Bess was introduced into the British Army in 1720 and remained in service until the 1840s. All models were .75 caliber (three-quarters of an inch, or 19 mm), but barrel length varied. The Long Land musket common to 1760 had a barrel 46 inches long, while the Short Land model, or “Second Model,” thereafter had a barrel 42 inches long and overall length of 58.25 inches. It weighed 8.80 pounds. The lock for both had a gooseneck cock with a convex surface. The Brown Bess mounted a 17-inch bayonet.

The French Charleville was produced in factories at St. Étienne, Maubeuge, Brescia, Tulle, and Charleville (Nozon Manufactory). French muskets were stamped with their place of manufacture, and all of these weapons were routinely known as Charlevilles. The Model 1717—unlike British or Spanish muskets—underwent numerous changes and modifications during the colonial period. For example, in 1728, metal bands replaced pins to secure the barrel in its wooden stock, making the barrel easier to remove. In 1746, a metal ramrod replaced the older wooden one. The 1768 model Charleville was lightened and known as the Léger. French armories produced some 150,000 of them. The Charleville was .69 caliber with a barrel length of 44.75 inches and an overall length of 60 inches; it weighed 9.47 pounds. The French shipped large numbers of the 1768 model to America, and it was the principal musket of the Continental Army in the American Revolutionary War. Later, the Charleville formed the basis of the first U.S. military musket, the Model 1795. Besides the standard military musket, other types of flintlock shoulder arms were employed during the revolution. These included carbines, musketoons, and blunderbusses. Carbines and musketoons were shorter muskets generally intended for socalled light infantry, cavalry, and use aboard ships. Most had barrels of 28–42 inches in length. Sometimes carbines were rifled. The blunderbuss was a large-caliber weapon with a short barrel and a distinctive flaring muzzle. The blunderbuss was specifically designed to spray a large number of pellets at close range. For this reason, it was the preferred weapon of naval boarding parties and coach guards. At sea, large blunderbusses known as boat guns (often mounted



on swivels) could fire up to one pound of shot. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Blair, Claude, ed. Pollard’s History of Firearms. New York: Macmillan, 1983. Brown, M. L. Firearms in Colonial America: The Impact on History and Technology, 1492–1792. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1980. Lenk, Torsten. The Flintlock: Its Origin and Development. New York: Bramhall House, 1965. Peterson, Harold L. Arms and Armor in Colonial America, 1526–1783. New York: Bramhall House, 1956.

Fort Stanwix, New York, Siege of(August 2–23, 1777) As part of Lieutenant General John Burgoyne’s invasion of upper New York state from Canada, Lieutenant Colonel Barrimore “Barry” St. Leger, given the temporary rank of brigadier general, was to carry out a diversionary operation to the west. He would advance up the St. Lawrence River and then proceed down the Mohawk Valley to link up with Burgoyne’s main force, drawing off American forces that might otherwise confront Burgoyne along his route of march down the Lake Champlain corridor. On July 23, 1777, St. Leger departed Montreal with a force of some 875 British regulars and Loyalists under Colonels Sir John Johnson and John Butler. Moving up the St. Lawrence to Lake Ontario, they were at Oswego, New York, on July 25, where they were joined by 800–1,000 Indians under Mohawk chief Joseph Brant. St.

Fort Stanwix, New York, Siege of | 99

Leger was also informed that the only major obstacle to his advance was Fort Stanwix (renamed Fort Schuyler) and that it was in poor repair and had only about 60 defenders. Based on this information, St. Leger decided to leave behind his heavy siege artillery. Averaging about 10 miles a day, St. Leger’s force proceeded along the Mohawk River valley toward Fort Stanwix. The fort was situated in a key location at the head of navigation of the Mohawk River on a portage between that river and Wood Creek that flows westward to Oswego. Built by the British during the French and Indian War (1754–1763), Fort Stanwix had since been abandoned. At the start of the American Revolutionary War in 1775, it was in a state of considerable disrepair. In April 1777, however, Colonel Peter Gansevoort had assumed command of the fort. Gansevoort along with his second-in-command, Lieutenant Colonel Marinus Willett, and their 550-man 3rd New York Regiment of the Continental Line labored to repair and strengthen the fort’s defenses. Although work had not been completed by St. Leger’s arrival, the fort nonetheless presented a formidable obstacle for an enemy without heavy artillery. In August 1777, the fort was held by some 550 men. On August 2, St. Leger’s advance column arrived at the fort, only to see an American pack column and reinforcements entering the fort, bringing much-needed supplies and increasing the size of the garrison to 750 men. St. Leger’s main body came up the next day, August 3. In an effort to intimidate the Americans, St. Leger paraded his entire force in full view of the fort. Being made aware that Native Americans constituted the majority of the British force only served to strengthen the determination of

100 | Fort Stanwix, New York, Siege of

the defenders, who reasoned that they could expect no quarter from the Indians if the British were victorious. Also strengthening Gansevoort’s resolve was the news that an American relief force under Brigadier General Nicholas Herkimer was on its way. Gansevoort promptly rejected a demand for surrender, and St. Leger commenced siege operations. Unable to make a tight investment, St. Leger distributed his men in three camps that formed a rough triangle, with the posts about a mile apart. Most of the regulars were in the main camp to the north of Fort Stanwix. To the south, at Lower Landing, he posted the Canadians, Loyalists, and Indians and the remainder of his regulars. Loyalists manned the third post, located west of the fort on Wood Creek. During the next few days, St. Leger employed a large number of his men cutting a supply road through the forest. On August 4–5, he had German jägers and Indian marksmen snipe at Fort Stanwix, without significant results. Meanwhile, having gathered some 800 Tryon County militiamen, Herkimer set out on August 4 from Fort Dayton with 60 Oneida scouts to march to Stanwix, 30 miles distant. St. Leger learned of this and, despite the strain on his resources, detached some 250 of his troops and an equal number of Indians under Brant in the hopes of ambushing Herkimer’s column. On the morning of August 6, only some six miles from his goal, Herkimer’s force blundered into a perfectly staged ambush near the village of Oriskany, for which the battle is named. Johnson, Butler, Brant, and their Loyalist and Iroquois forces overwhelmed Herkimer. Following a bloody six-hour-long fight at very close quarters, the Indians tired of the battle and broke off the attack, forcing the Loyalists to withdraw as well. The

surviving New York militiamen then fell back on Fort Dayton. Still, the Patriot side sustained perhaps 200 dead, 50 wounded (Herkimer mortally), and 30 captured. The Loyalists and Native Americans together may have suffered 100–150 total casualties. This Loyalist victory was offset by a concurrent American sortie from Fort Stanwix, which Herkimer had requested as a diversion timed for his arrival. Lieutenant Colonel Willett led 250 men with one gun to destroy one of St. Leger’s three camps. Willett marched against the British post at the Lower Landing and easily swept aside the defenders, who fled into the woods. The Patriots then methodically looted the abandoned camp, returning to the fort with 21 wagonloads of supplies and Sir John Johnson’s personal papers. Now short of supplies and having already sustained significant manpower losses, the Native Americans allied with St. Leger lost heart and began to desert. On August 7, St. Leger again called on Gansevoort to surrender and, trumpeting Herkimer’s defeat, also claimed, incorrectly, that Burgoyne had reached Albany. In a thinly veiled threat, St. Leger also suggested that if the fort had to be taken by force, he might not be able to control his Indian allies, who would slaughter not only the garrison but also settlers up and down the Mohawk Valley. Gansevoort refused, but he did agree to a three-day truce, with the plan to take advantage of it to secure reinforcements, for on August 9, Willett slipped through the British lines and traveled to Fort Dayton. Burgoyne’s main army was then at Fort Edward, only 29 miles distant, but Continental Army major general Philip Schuyler, who had only 4,500 men to Burgoyne’s 8,000, made the risky decision of detaching 950 men from his force, sending them under Major General Benedict



France and the American Revolutionary War | 101

Arnold and Brigadier General Ebenezer Leonard to Fort Stanwix. Reaching Fort Dayton on August 21, Arnold was joined by 100 men of the Tryon County Militia. Arnold now decided on a stratagem to deceive St. Leger, sending ahead to the British camp a mentally handicapped Dutch resident of the Mohawk Valley by the name of Hon Yost (or Hon Yost Schuyler). Yost had earlier been condemned to death for involvement in a Loyalist plot, but Arnold promised to pardon him if presented an exaggerated picture of the relief column to the British. Yost did as instructed, telling the British and Indians that the relief column was “more numerous than the leaves on the trees.” This false information led many of the allied Iroquois, who held the insane in superstitious awe, to desert. On August 22, Arnold learned that St. Leger had pushed his approaches to within 150 yards of Fort Stanwix’s northwest bastion and that Gansevoort’s position was perilous. The next day, however, with Arnold’s relief column near, St. Leger raised the siege, abandoning both stores and cannon in a precipitous withdrawal to Oswego. In the siege of Fort Stanwix, the British, Hessian, and Loyalist forces sustained 5 killed, 47 wounded or sick, and 41 captured or missing. Allied Indian losses were 32 killed, captured, or missing and 34 wounded. American losses were 7 killed, 18 wounded, and 9 missing. Arnold sent a column to pursue St. Leger, but it only reached Oswego in time to see the British sailing away. Arnold left 700 men at Fort Stanwix and then moved eastward with 1,200 men to strengthen the U.S. forces opposing the main British army under Burgoyne. St. Leger’s failure to take Fort Stanwix undoubtedly contributed to Burgoyne’s ultimate defeat in October 1777. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Ketchum, Richard M. Saratoga: Turning Point of America’s Revolutionary War. New York: Henry Holt, 1997. Nester, William R. The Frontier War for American Independence. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole, 2004. Nickerson, Hoffman. The Turning Point of the Revolution. 1928. Reprint, Port Washington, NY: Kennikat, 1967. Pancake, John S. 1777: The Year of the Hangman. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1977. Scott, John Albert. Fort Stanwix and Oriskany: The Romantic Story of the Repulse of St. Leger’s British Invasion of 1777. Rome, NY: Rome Sentinel, 1927. Watt, Gavin K., and James F. Morrison. Rebellion in the Mohawk Valley: The St. Leger Expedition of 1777. Toronto: Dundurn, 2002.

France and the American Revolutionary War France is Western Europe’s largest country and has been a major European and world power since at least the Middle Ages. In 1775, it also possessed a considerable overseas empire, including possessions in the Caribbean, Africa, and Asia. France’s population in 1775 was approximately 25 million. (By contrast, France’s rival Great Britain had a population of about 10 million, with Ireland adding fewer than 4 million). Blessed with abundant natural resources, a productive agricultural base, and a growing middle class, France in 1789 was also Europe’s wealthiest nation. In an age when agriculture still predominated, France was richer than Great Britain. But Great Britain was far better administered. The British Parliament had gained considerable power, and the government had access to greater resources than did France.

102 | France and the American Revolutionary War

Ironically, conservative France was also the font of the intellectual movement known as the Enlightenment. Its important trio of writers—the philosophers Charles-Louis de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu (1689– 1755); François Arouet (1694–1778), writing under the nom de plume of Voltaire; and Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778)—had a pronounced influence on American thinkers regarding both society and governance. Other French philosophers, most notably Anne-Robert-Jacques Turgot, Baron de Laune (1727–1781), concerned themselves with such issues as the necessity for economic reform and free trade. Although other governments, namely Spain and the Dutch Republic, also supported the Patriot cause as a means of weakening British world power, France’s aid in that struggle was clearly the most important. French financial and military assistance was critical to the United States winning its independence. As early as September 1775, French agents were in America to assess the rebellion and its course. American privateers operating against Britain soon found welcome in French ports, and beginning in March 1776, the French government extended financial assistance to the rebels. That same year, the French government ordered the shipment of weapons and munitions to the West Indies for transshipment to North America. France thus became the chief source of arms supplies for the revolutionary cause. The French government did not extend aid to the American rebels, because its leaders supported the ideals of the American Revolution. Indeed, Louis XVI could hardly be expected to favor rebellion by a people against their sovereign. Rather, French support for the American colonies in their revolt was largely the work of one man: Charles Gravier, comte de Vergennes, the

French foreign minister from 1774 to 1787. Concerned about British efforts to woo Russia, Vergennes believed that the British were bent on world domination, and he sought to develop alliances with Spain and the Dutch Republic to secure a balance of power and thwart British ambitions. But certainly a driving motive for Vergennes was revenge for the humiliating defeat sustained by France at the hands of Britain in the French and Indian War (1754–1763), known in Europe as the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763). Turgot, who had been intendant at Limoges (1761–1774), understood the problems and dangers that France faced. In August 1774, in a surprise move at the beginning of his reign, Louis XVI appointed Turgot controller general of finance, arguably the most important position in the French government. At the time, royal expenditures were far outstripping revenues, and Turgot proposed a whole host of reforms, including a free market economy with the removal of the many internal restrictions on trade, suppression of the guilds, abolition of the corvée (whereby peasants were required to labor on the roads), subsidies to encourage the development of certain industries, and religious tolerance. Most important, Turgot wanted to reform the tax system with the elimination of exemptions. This, of course, struck directly at the nobles and the church. Great opposition to Turgot’s program from the nobility and especially the court led the weak-willed Louis XVI to dismiss Turgot in May 1776, and his reforms went with him. This decision was fateful for France, for Turgot was the chief opponent of Vergennes within the royal council and his policy of secret aid to the American rebels. The prescient Turgot believed that colonies were of only negligible commercial value and that the loss of America would do little



France and the American Revolutionary War | 103

to hurt Britain economically. He also repeatedly told both the king and the council that the only way the massive French budget deficits could be handled was for the government to institute a policy of fiscal restraint that included no new wars. Turgot stated that the costs of intervention in America would postpone, perhaps forever, meaningful reform. He even went so far as to suggest that the fate of the monarchy might hinge on this one decision. By late 1775, Vergennes had concluded that the American rebels could not win without foreign military assistance, and in early 1776, he carried to the king a scheme developed by French playwright Pierre de Beaumarchais, who had previously performed diplomatic missions for the Crown. Beaumarchais proposed the creation of a bogus private trading firm, known as Hortalez, Rodrique et Cie, which would operate from Spain and channel equipment and arms to the Patriots in America. Vergennes also urged that France and Spain prepare for eventual war with Britain, to occur when propitious. On April 22, 1776, King Louis XVI issued an order to rebuild the French Navy and secure new equipment for the army. This edict released substantial stocks of older French military equipment and weapons for Beaumarchais to ship to the Americans. On May 2, Beaumarchais was granted an allocation of 1 million livres for the project. France also prevailed on Spain to provide an equal sum. The Patriot side especially needed gunpowder, and Beaumarchais hoped to make a substantial profit for the Crown by obtaining the gunpowder at 5 sous per pound from government arsenals and then selling it to the Americans at 20 sous per pound, to be paid for in tobacco. Profits would then be plowed back, multiplying the amount of the aid. As usually

turns out with such schemes, the French Crown saw little in the way of financial return. This aid was to be kept strictly secret. Ultimately, Beaumarchais would dispense some 21 million livres in French government funds from 1776 to 1783. He secured, mostly from government arsenals, more than 200 cannon and 30,000 small arms, the latter including the excellent Charleville musket, which remained the standard American infantry weapon well after the American Revolutionary War. The French also provided 100 tons of gunpowder, 20–30 brass mortars, and clothing and tents sufficient for 25,000 men. This was a tremendous amount of aid, especially considering that the maximum size of the Continental Army was just 20,000 men. Its importance cannot be overstated. The impact of this assistance was clear in the pivotal battles of the Saratoga campaign (June 14–October 17, 1777), which brought the surrender of one-third of the British Army in North America. One scholarly source estimates that nine-tenths of the arms employed by the Americans at Saratoga came from France. The American victory at Saratoga served to convince doubters in the French court that the Americans did indeed have a chance of winning. In February 1778, the French Crown and American diplomats concluded two treaties in which France formally recognized the United States. The first was a Treaty of Amity and Commerce, with a most favored nation clause. The second was the Franco-American Treaty of Alliance. Both parties agreed to continue the fight against Britain until American independence was “formally or tacitly assured.” Neither France nor the United States was to conclude a separate peace, and each guaranteed the possessions of the other in

104 | France and the American Revolutionary War

perpetuity. War between France and Great Britain formally began on March 17, 1778. The war was immensely popular in France, and a number of individual Frenchmen volunteered to serve in America. Some, including military engineers, were selected and given leave from the French Army. The volunteers were recruited by American representatives in Paris and received commissions from the Continental Congress. Such individuals were motivated by a wide range of factors, including idealism, the desire for professional military experience, and personal financial gain. Those who came to America to assist in the fight against Britain would include key figures in the Continental Army. Arguably the most important was Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roche Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, a member of one of the most prominent noble families of France. He rose to become a major general, a key major field commander, and virtually an adopted son of Continental Army commander general George Washington. Not all of these appointments worked out well, of course. Still, many of the volunteers gave their lives for the cause of American independence. The entry of France into the war was a threat to every part of the British Empire, including India and especially the West Indies. The war now ceased to be wholly a land operation and largely became a contest of sea power. From 1778, except in North America itself, Britain was on the defensive and compelled to surrender the initiative. This change was further accentuated in 1779 when Spain entered the war. In December 1780, rising tensions over its claim to search Dutch shipping led the British government to declare war on the Dutch Republic. While the Royal Navy was adequate to secure the Atlantic sea-lanes, it was not sufficiently dominant to meet all

possibilities, the most worrisome of which was that France might actually invade the British Isles. The British weathered the threat of a Bourbon invasion in 1779, but this was more from poor allied leadership and disease than any action on the part of the Royal Navy. Spain’s interest was chiefly in securing Gibraltar. Although the British managed to hold on to that important possession and indeed maintain most of its empire outside America, it meant that few resources would be available for major offensive operations in North America. French support was crucial and marked the turning point in the war. French troops had been unsuccessful in an effort to retake Savannah, Georgia, from the British (September 16–October 18, 1779). In July 1780, 5,500 French troops, commanded by Lieutenant General Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau, arrived at Newport, Rhode Island, to cooperate with General Washington’s forces against the British. It was the participation of regiments of the French Army in conjunction with squadrons of a powerful French fleet that made possible the defeat of Britain in the war. French troops took the leading role in the critical siege operations at Yorktown in September–October 1781. Indeed, that pivotal allied victory, which brought down the British government, was made possible by a brief period of French naval supremacy and success in the Second Battle of the Chesapeake the month before. In all, some 44,200 Frenchmen took part in the war: 31,500 in the navy and 12,700 in the army. Of these, 5,040 died in the cause of American independence: 3,420 in the navy and 1,620 in the army. Following the British defeat in the Battle of Yorktown, London adopted a policy of cutting its losses and treating both the



France and the American Revolutionary War | 105

United States and Spain generously to wean them from France. London ceded Florida to Spain, along with the island of Minorca, but kept Gibraltar, which the British had successfully defended during the war. U.S. leaders ignored their treaty with France that prohibited a separate peace with Britain and proceeded to do just that. In the settlement of 1783, the new republic obtained territory as far west as the Mississippi. For all its efforts, France secured only the island of Tobago in the West Indies and Senegal in Africa. Some have argued that the United States would not have won its independence without French intervention. If the states had been forced to rely entirely on their own means, perhaps they would have voted the resources necessary to continue the war. But without this, the Continental Army, sooner or later, would have disbanded. Resistance would only have been possible by guerrilla warfare, and because a large percentage of the population was either opposed to or indifferent to independence, this might not have continued for very long. The irony of French support is obvious. The vast sums necessary to fight the war bankrupted France. The cost of the French military intervention was particularly high in the naval sphere. In 1778, the first year of the war, France spent 125 million livres on the navy and 165 million in the last year. Total naval expenditures alone were on the order of 1.063 billion livres, with total expenditure on the war at more than 2 billion livres, exclusive of interest payments on the new debt incurred. The man who found the money was Swiss banker Jacques Necker, the director general of finance during 1776–1781. Necker was able to fund the war, but he paid too much for the money, which he chiefly secured in the form of annuities,

known as rentes viagères. In issuing these, the government failed to follow any tables of life expectancy. By the mid-1780s, 51 percent of the national income was going to pay the interest on the debt. It was thus no longer possible to run the French government with the tax resources then available. This forced the Crown to move to tax the two sources of income previously exempt and that nonetheless controlled perhaps half of the wealth of France: the nobility and the church. In the so-called Aristocratic Reaction of 1787, the Parlement of Paris balked and insisted on the calling of the States General, which the nobles expected to control. The Crown gave way, but the success of the nobles in this encouraged the members of the Third Estate. When the States General met at Versailles, it stood firm, and the result was the French Revolution of 1789, the direct result of France’s involvement in the American Revolutionary War. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Dull, Jonathan R. A Diplomatic History of the American Revolution. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1985. Hoffman, Ronald, and Peter J. Albert, eds. Diplomacy and Revolution: The FrancoAmerican Alliance of 1778. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1981. Hoffman, Ronald, and Peter J. Albert, eds. Peace and the Peacemakers: The Treaty of 1783. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1986. Lever, Maurice, and Susan Emmanuel. Beaumarchais: A Biography. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2009. Murphy, Orville T. Charles Gravier, Comte de Vergennes: French Diplomacy in the Age of Revolution, 1719–1787. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1982.

106 | Franklin, Benjamin Perkins, James Breck. France in the American Revolution. Williamstown, MA: Corner House Publishers, 1970. Stinchcombe, William C. The American Revolution and the French Alliance. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1969.

Franklin, Benjamin(1706–1790) Writer, publisher, diplomat, philosopher, celebrated scientist, revolutionary leader, politician, Founding Father, and leader in the Pennsylvania Assembly, Benjamin Franklin was born on January 6, 1706, in Boston, Massachusetts. He was apprenticed at age 12 to learn the printing trade. However, in September 1723, he terminated this

Benjamin Franklin earned worldwide acclaim as a writer, scientist, statesman, and diplomat. Franklin signed the Declaration of Independence and proved an adroit diplomat in securing aid for the Patriot cause from France. (National Gallery of Art/Gift of Adele Lewisohn Lehman)

apprenticeship and moved to Philadelphia, where he found a job as a printer. For the next 24 years, Franklin’s business contacts and expertise grew exponentially, as did the number of his publications. Relatively wealthy by his midthirties, Franklin turned over his printing business to a partner and concentrated on humanitarian, philosophical, and scientific interests. His rudimentary tinkering with lightning, magnetism, and electricity resulted in Experiments and Observations on Electricity (1751). During this highly productive phase of his life, Franklin became the influential clerk of the Pennsylvania Assembly. He also initiated several important public projects in Philadelphia, including the American Philosophical Society, the Pennsylvania Hospital, a mutual fire insurance company, and a discussion group that evolved into the University of Pennsylvania. By the middle of the eighteenth century, Franklin was the most famous living American, in large part because of his many inventions. After the French and Indian War erupted in 1754, Franklin participated in several colonial-Indian treaty congresses and helped procure wagons and teams for a failed expedition against French Fort Duquesne. The Pennsylvania Assembly voted to send Franklin as its agent to London in 1757. Returning to Pennsylvania in 1762, he designed a plan for backcountry forts. In 1764, Franklin returned to Britain as an agent for Pennsylvania and later for other colonies. During this phase of his career, he became known as a highly effective diplomat. In the British House of Commons, he eloquently argued the Americans’ case regarding the 1765 Stamp Act, asserting that it was not the stamp tax itself but the intrusion on traditional constitutional rights of British subjects that was objectionable.



In early 1775, Franklin sailed from England to America, there to become a leading advocate of armed rebellion and independence from the British. Franklin’s immediate reelection to the Pennsylvania Assembly, his appointment as postmaster general, and his service as a delegate to the Second Continental Congress allowed him little time to recuperate from his sojourn. Congress quickly appointed him to several of its most challenging committees. But Franklin’s most vital contributions to the cause of American independence were still to come. In October 1776, Franklin sailed to France as one of three commissioners to the French court representing the newly formed United States. In Europe, he adeptly mobilized his celebrity status on behalf of the American cause. The French public adored Franklin and embraced his reputation as an Enlightenment philosopher, scientist, and diplomat. Ever the showman, Franklin often donned a fur hat and rough-hewn clothing while in Paris in a bid to appear humble yet intriguing to Parisian high society. The Parisians in turn declared Franklin a New World rustic Renaissance man. Franklin helped negotiate the critical Treaty of Alliance between France and the United States (February 6, 1778), without which the Patriot cause would likely have been doomed. The war officially ended with the Treaty of Paris (September 3, 1783), in which Franklin also had a hand. This settlement resulted from complex negotiations among three major European powers, each with its own expectations and concerns. The fourth party to the negotiations, the former American colonies, hoped to preserve their territorial claims against the Spanish and the British and avoid having their territory carved into spheres of influence reparations by the various European powers.

Franklin, Benjamin | 107

Under Franklin’s canny and sophisticated leadership, the American delegation maintained a central position in the discussions by conducting initial negotiations in strict conjunction with France, thereby encouraging France to avoid separate communications with Great Britain. Later, however, French and Spanish suspicions that the Americans might make separate agreements with Britain motivated a more hasty settlement. The United States clearly benefited enormously from Franklin’s strategies despite its position as the weakest party in the negotiations. Still in France after the hard work of the treaty had been concluded, Franklin, now 78 years old, kept busy with scientific pursuits. On July 27, 1785, he sailed from Europe to return to America. Arriving in Philadelphia in September, he was immediately elected to the new state’s Executive Council. Within weeks, he was chosen the president of Pennsylvania’s Supreme Executive Council, a position he held until 1788. In 1787, Franklin hosted the opening dinner of the Constitutional Convention. As a leading delegate during the following months of negotiation and legislative innovation, he saw most of his motions defeated or respectfully tabled. In the eyes of many, Franklin had become too radical, pushing for wider popular democracy. But the lingering obstacle to the framing of government remained the dispute between large states’ and small states’ national representation. Franklin submitted the motion that has come to be called the “grand compromise.” The U.S. House of Representatives would be elected on the basis of each state’s population, and each state, large and small, would elect two U.S. senators. The motion passed, and the new U.S. Constitution of 1787 was ratified. During his final three years, Franklin updated his incomplete Autobiography of

108 | Franklin, Benjamin

Benjamin Franklin and wrote several papers against slavery. Franklin died in Philadelphia on April 17, 1790, at age 84. Joe Petrulionis

Further Reading Brands, H. W. The First American: The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin. New York: Doubleday, 2000.

Franklin, Benjamin. Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005. Houston, Alan, ed. Franklin: The Autobiography and Other Writings on Politics, Economics, and Virtue. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004. Wright, Esmond. Franklin of Philadelphia. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1986.

G Gage, Thomas(1719?–1787)

In 1755, during the French and Indian War (1754–1763), Gage and his regiment were attached to the army of Major General Edward Braddock, the British commander in chief in North America. During the subsequent advance on Fort Duquesne, Gage and George Washington, then serving as a volunteer with the British, became well acquainted. On July 9, 1755, in the Battle of the Monongahela, a body of Frenchmen and Indians ambushed Braddock’s column, and Gage’s advanced troops were struck first. Gage and his men fell back on the main column, precipitating considerable confusion. Although Gage was later accused of retreating prematurely and triggering a British catastrophe, the charges appear to be unfounded. In the battle, Gage was slightly wounded, and Braddock was killed. The commander of the 44th Regiment was also killed, and Gage assumed command of its survivors. Gage’s regiment was ordered to Albany for the winter of 1755–1756, and he served as second-in-command during an unsuccessful expedition up the Mohawk River in August 1756. During the summer of 1757, he took part in an abortive campaign against Louisbourg on Cape Breton Island. In December 1757, Gage secured permission to raise a special body of provincial light infantry, the 80th Regiment. Promoted to colonel, he led his regiment in the summer of 1758 as part of Major General James Abercromby’s abortive assault against Fort Ticonderoga. In November, Gage learned that he had been promoted to temporary brigadier general.

British Army officer, governor of Massachusetts (1774–1775), and commander in chief of the British Army in North America at the beginning of the American Revolutionary War, Thomas Gage was born circa 1719 in England, the second son of Thomas Gage, a viscount in the Irish peerage. Young Gage was aided in his military career by his elder brother, William, who inherited the family estate. While at Westminster School, Thomas met William and Richard Howe, William Legge (later Lord Dartmouth), and George Sackville (later Lord George Germain), all of whom would be important to his military career. Sometime between 1736 and 1740, Gage was commissioned an ensign. On January 30, 1741, Gage was promoted to lieutenant in the 48th Regiment, and in May 1742, he began serving as captain lieutenant in Battereau’s Corps in the Irish establishment. Gage was promoted to captain of the 62nd Regiment, also in the Irish establishment, in January 1743. He was appointed aide-de-camp to the 2nd Duke of Albemarle, under whom he campaigned in the Low Countries in 1747–1748 during the War of the Austrian Succession (1740– 1748). Gage was promoted to major of the 55th Regiment in 1748 and remained with it for almost a decade. On March 2, 1751, Gage, a popular officer with the nickname “Honest Tom,” was promoted to lieutenant colonel. After unsuccessfully dabbling in politics, he was ordered with his regiment to America in 1754. 109

110 | Gage, Thomas

In the opening phase of operations in 1759 against Fort Ticonderoga, Gage was commissioned a permanent brigadier general after the death of General John Prideaux. On September 6, 1760, after the French surrender in Canada, Gage commenced a three-year stint as governor of Montreal. Although he disliked Catholics and despised Indians, he was a successful governor. Gage was promoted to major general in 1761, and a year later, he was commissioned colonel of the 22nd Regiment, a sinecural position. In October 1763, Gage was appointed temporary commander in chief of British forces in North America, and a year later, he was confirmed as permanent commander in chief. From his headquarters in New York City, Gage commanded 5,000 troops serving in posts across half a continent. Inheriting Indian problems from his predecessor, Gage succeeded in quelling Pontiac’s Rebellion on the frontier by 1764. In December 1768, he became a member of the American Philosophical Society and was promoted to lieutenant general in December 1770. Mounting political difficulties in the colonies, particularly radical reactions to the Stamp Act (1765) and the Townshend Acts (1767), led Gage to move large numbers of his troops eastward from their frontier posts. By April 30, 1769, he had shifted four regiments, one-third of all his forces, to Boston. In July, he removed two of them. Although Gage strongly believed that he must support British sovereignty, he understood the colonists’ point of view. He therefore tried with considerable success to keep both the ministers in London and the colonists happy. Once the furor unleashed by the Boston Massacre in March 1770 had died down, he enjoyed three years of relative tranquility. On June 8, 1773, he returned to Britain on leave and was welcomed into London society. Shocked by the

destruction of a shipment of tea by Bostonians in late 1773, Gage decided that the Americans had gone too far. Nevertheless, he confidently informed King George III that four regiments would be adequate to quell discontent in New England. In April 1774, after Parliament passed the Massachusetts Government Act (one of the Coercive Acts), the king announced that Gage was returning to America as military governor of Massachusetts. Gage arrived in Boston on May 17, and he received a formal but not entirely cordial welcome. The citizenry respected him as an honorable man who would work for a reasonable settlement of Anglo-American differences, even though he was duty bound to enforce the Coercive Acts. But they feared that his loyalty to the British Crown would inevitably make him their enemy. Such would prove to be the case. Making Salem the new capital of Massachusetts, Gage, in cooperation with a British fleet sent by London to enforce the Coercive Acts, blockaded Boston. He selected a new council but maintained strict discipline among his troops to keep tensions at a minimum. On September 1, 1774, he sent troops to seize gunpowder at Cambridge, provoking hundreds of American militiamen to arms. His confidence shaken, he fortified Boston. Joined in December by four more regiments and 500 marines, his forces now numbered 3,500 men, whom he confined entirely to the town. Nor would he employ them, having no reasonable military objective in view. During the next few months, Gage sent letter after letter to Lord Dartmouth, secretary of state for the colonies, indicating that he had changed his mind about the ease with which the people of Massachusetts could be coerced. Gage now reported that they would not yield to British coercion,

Gates, Horatio | 111



that they would fight for their “rights as Englishmen” as they saw them, and that the southern colonies would assist them if it came to war. In such circumstances, Gage said that Britain would need an army of 20,000 men in Massachusetts, and even then, the task would not be easy. He suggested that Britain instead employ a naval blockade to break the will of the colonists. By early 1775, ministers in London had completely lost confidence in Gage’s ability to resolve the crisis. Believing his recommendations to be defeatist nonsense, they dispatched three major generals to “assist” him and ordered him to employ the troops he already commanded. Therefore, on April 18, 1775, he dispatched contingents of his army against Lexington and Concord. These troops were beset by colonial militiamen the next day and almost cut off, retreating back to Boston after suffering severe losses. Thereafter, Boston was besieged by thousands of American troops, and Gage meditated on ways to break the blockade. On the night of June 16–17, the colonials constructed a redoubt on a hill on Charlestown Peninsula, a site that commanded Boston Harbor. Gage ordered Major General William Howe to attack the Patriot force the next day. Successful in the Battle of Bunker Hill, Howe cleared the peninsula of Patriot militiamen but suffered tremendous casualties in the process. Even before news of Bunker Hill reached London, Germain, who had replaced Dartmouth as secretary of state for America, was plotting to remove Gage from command. Germain now acted. On September 26, Gage received orders to return to London for consultations, leaving Howe as commander in chief in his stead. Gage reached London on November 14, and four days later, he was finally notified that his commission as commander in chief in

North America was revoked. As a sop, he was allowed to retain his military rank and his sinecure as governor of Massachusetts. Thereafter, Gage devoted himself to caring for his family and avoiding political controversy. It was not until April 1781 that he finally returned to military duty. On November 20, 1782, after the fall of the Lord Frederick North ministry, Gage was promoted to full general. He died in London on April 7, 1787. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Alden, John Richard. General Gage in America: Being Principally a History of His Role in the American Revolution. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1948. O’Shaughnessy, Andrew Jackson. The Men Who Lost America: British Leadership, the American Revolution, and the Fate of the Empire. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2013. Shy, John. Toward Lexington: The Role of the British Army in the Coming of the American Revolution. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1965.

Gates, Horatio(1728–1806) Horatio Gates was born in April 1728 in Maldon, Essex, England. Of humble origins, he was commissioned in 1745 as an ensign in the British Army. During the next 18 years, he saw extensive service in Europe and America and became a capable military administrator. By the end of the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), he had risen to the rank of major, but at that point, his career stalled. Turning to drink and gambling, he resigned his commission in 1769, flirted with Methodism, and became republican in his political views. He became acquainted

112 | Gates, Horatio

with Americans living in London, such as Benjamin Franklin, and decided to immigrate to North America. In 1772, Gates and his family settled on a farm in the lower Shenandoah Valley in Virginia. In 1775, with the coming of the American Revolutionary War, Gates declared himself in favor of the Patriot struggle. The Continental Congress, desperately in need of professional officers and aware of Gates’s reputation as a political liberal and army administrator, commissioned him a brigadier general in the Continental Army on June 17, 1775, and appointed him adjutant general. Gates joined General George Washington, the commander in chief of the Continental Army, at Boston on July 9, and for the next few months, he employed his military knowledge to bring order and regularity to an army badly in need of organization and discipline. Following the British evacuation of Boston in March 1776, Gates accompanied Washington to New York. On May 16, Congress promoted Gates to major general and then, on June 18, gave him command of the American forces that had invaded Canada the year before. When he went north to assume his new duties, he discovered that the army had retreated into New York and that Major General Philip Schuyler, the commander of the Northern Department, was asserting the right to command the force. On July 8, Congress adjudicated the dispute in Schuyler’s favor, and Gates reluctantly yielded. Schuyler then appointed Gates commander of forces at Fort Ticonderoga. For the remainder of 1776, Gates worked harmoniously with Schuyler and Brigadier General Benedict Arnold, assisting the latter in construction of a gunboat flotilla on Lake Champlain to thwart Brigadier General Sir Guy Carleton’s attempts to capture Fort Ticonderoga and launch a

major invasion southward via the Lake Champlain route. On December 2, 1776, Gates marched southward with eight Continental regiments to reinforce Washington’s army on the Delaware River. Gates spent the winter lobbying political friends in Congress to supersede Schuyler in command of the Northern Department, and on March 25, 1777, he succeeded. Two months later, however, on May 15, Schuyler again secured command of the Northern Department, and Gates rushed southward to mobilize his political supporters. As the two generals squabbled, in Canada, Lieutenant General John Burgoyne organized British forces for an invasion of upper New York. On July 5, Burgoyne captured Fort Ticonderoga, and although Schuyler conducted a masterful scorched-earth withdrawal toward the Hudson River, Congress was unhappy with the retreat; therefore, Gates again superseded him on August 4. With his command position secure, Gates concentrated on halting Burgoyne’s progress toward Albany. Gates constructed powerful defensive works on Bemis Heights, a strategic bottleneck in Burgoyne’s path of invasion, and ensconced his army behind them to await Burgoyne’s arrival. On September 19, in the Battle of Freeman’s Farm, Gates stymied Burgoyne’s attempt to turn the American left, with Major General Benedict Arnold and Colonel Daniel Morgan playing key roles in the fighting. For the next few days, Burgoyne encamped near the American lines while Gates and Arnold quarreled and the latter threatened to decamp for Philadelphia. Then, on October 7, in the Battle of Bemis Heights, Burgoyne attempted another breakthrough to Albany, only to be halted again by Arnold and Morgan. Desperately short of supplies, Burgoyne surrendered to Gates at Saratoga on October 17.



In the winter of 1777–1778, Gates was involved in the so-called Conway Cabal, an alleged conspiracy to remove Washington as commander in chief and replace him with Gates. Some supporters of Washington alleged that it included Major General Thomas Conway and Brigadier General Thomas Mifflin as well as certain politicians. Gates was viewed as a willing subject of other men’s schemes. Although there was no conspiracy, Washington used the rumors against Gates to bolster his own position, treating Gates and his friends with scorn. This attitude devalued any good service that Gates might have contributed in his next assignment, president of the Board of War, during the winter of 1777–1778. Although Gates managed to survive the storm of invective, he emerged from the experience with a strong dislike of Washington and his admirers. On April 15, 1778, Gates took command of the Hudson Highlands and served there during the following summer. He temporarily commanded at Boston in September; at Hartford, Connecticut, in October; and again at Boston during the winter of 1778– 1779. On June 13, 1780, his friends in Congress secured for him command of the Southern Department following the fiasco of Charles Town (Charleston) and capture by the British of Major General Benjamin Lincoln’s army on May 12. Washington had no say in the decision. Gates took command of his small army at Coxe’s Mill, North Carolina, on July 25. Two days later, he marched his troops toward South Carolina, hoping to maneuver his forces into position north of Camden, build defensive fortifications, and defy the British army to attack at great disadvantage. Unfortunately for him, on the night of August 15, he blundered into Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis’s British army marching

Gates, Horatio | 113

northward to attack him. Gates was therefore compelled to fight in open country, where the odds were against him, for twothirds of his men were untrained militia. In the Battle of Camden, on August 16, Gates did not improve his chances by ordering his militia to charge British regulars. The entire left of his battle line quickly collapsed, and although his regulars held for a time, his army was swept from the field. By then, having failed to rally the militia, Gates had abandoned the army, riding north to Hillsborough, North Carolina, where he hoped to rebuild his shattered forces. During the next three months, Gates struggled to restore his army while Congress debated his future. On October 5, the legislators voted to call a court of inquiry to examine his conduct at Camden and allowed Washington to appoint his successor, Major General Nathanael Greene. Forced into retirement, Gates was allowed by his political foes to languish for two years. The court of inquiry was never held, and Congress did not rescind its resolution and allow Gates to join Washington’s army at Newburgh, New York, until August 14, 1782. As second-in-command there, Gates served during the winter of 1782–1783, playing a role in the Newburgh Conspiracy in which officers were encouraged to protest perceived ill treatment by Congress. In late March 1783, Gates left the army and returned home to his dying wife. Embittered and lonely, he railed for a time against politicians, but in 1786, his mood improved when he married a rich widow and moved to New York. Although he favored the Constitution of 1787, he later became a Jeffersonian Democratic-Republican. In 1800, he was elected to one term in the New York legislature. Gates died in New York City on April 10, 1806. Paul David Nelson

114 | George III, King of Great Britain

Further Reading Mintz, Max M. The Generals of Saratoga: John Burgoyne and Horatio Gates. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1990. Nelson, Paul David. General Horatio Gates: A Biography. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1976. Nelson, Paul David. General Sir Guy Carleton, Lord Dorchester: Soldier-Statesman of Early British Canada. Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2000. Rossie, Jonathan Gregory. The Politics of Command in the American Revolution. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1975.

George III, King of Great Britain (1738–1820) Future British king George III (r. 1760– 1820) was born George William Frederick on June 4, 1738. George became heir to the throne when his father died in 1751, and he became King of Great Britain and King of Ireland on October 25, 1760. On January 1, 1801, when these two countries were united, he became King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. When George III ascended the throne, Britain was in the midst of the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763). The British monarchy at the time lacked effective executive machinery, and members of Parliament were always more ready to criticize than to cooperate with the king. The government had two principal challenges: to make peace and to restore peacetime finances. Peace was made but in such a way as to isolate Britain in Europe, and for almost 30 years the country suffered from the new alignments of the European powers. Overseas trade expanded, but the riches of the British East India Company made no significant

contribution to the state. In addition, the attempt to make the American colonists meet their own administrative costs only roused them to resistance. In 1765, George III and Parliament angered the American colonists with the Stamp Act. Later, indirect taxes were imposed and then, in a political maneuver, repealed (except for the tax on tea). In 1768, George III was persuaded to authorize the sending of troops to Boston to quiet the unrest caused by yet another series of taxes levied by Parliament. In 1770, George III found a minister he liked, Lord Frederick North, and 12 years of relatively stable governmental administration followed a decade of disturbance. Unfortunately, during the same period, the American Revolutionary War interceded, beginning in April 1775, which demonstrated the American colonists’ growing contempt for George III because he had inextricably linked himself with Parliament and its policies. With conviction, George III cooperated with Parliament in trying to suppress the American rebellion by force of arms. He only succeeded in embroiling the British in a frustrating colonial conflict that lasted for nearly eight years. By 1779, the typical English squires in Parliament had tired of the war, but the king argued that although the war was indefensible on economic grounds, it still had to be fought. If disobedience was seen to prosper, he argued, Ireland would follow suit. After the French joined the Americans in 1778, he maintained that French finances would collapse before those of Britain. By 1780, a majority in Parliament blamed Lord North’s government for the failed war, but there was no responsible or acceptable alternative, for the opposition was believed to be both unpatriotic and divided. Nevertheless,



people believed that corruption alone supported an administration that was equally incapable of waging war or ending it. This alleged increase in corruption was laid directly at the king’s door. Meanwhile, Lord North wearily repeated his wish to resign, thus appearing to be a mere puppet of George III. When North’s government fell at last in 1782, the king’s prestige was at low ebb. Lord North then joined with the liberal Whig Charles James Fox to form a coalition government. In 1783, the American Revolutionary War finally came to an end. King George presided over a sizable defeat in a significant colonial struggle that witnessed the loss of Britain’s 13 colonies, from Maine (then part of Massachusetts) to Georgia. The many stresses endured by George III may have accounted for his mental breakdown, a situation that divided historians for years. Twentieth-century medical investigation, however, has suggested that the king had an inherited defect in his metabolism known as porphyria, an excess in purplered pigments in the blood that intoxicated all parts of the nervous system, producing agonizing pain, overactivity, paralysis, and delirium. It appears that the king suffered an acute form of this malady at least four times during his reign. In 1788, the king’s incapacity produced a political storm, but while politicians William Pitt the Younger and Charles James Fox battled over the powers that George, the king’s son and heir to the throne, should enjoy as regent, the king suddenly recovered in 1789. After the outbreak of war with revolutionary France in 1793, all but the most radical Whigs now joined the government. To most of the aristocracy and the upper middle class, the war with France seemed to be waged for national survival, and the old

George III, King of Great Britain | 115

king, an object of compassion, was soon a symbol of the old English order for which the country was fighting. Although his potential power in politics was greatly increased, his will to wield it was enfeebled. The French war had made the issue of Roman Catholic emancipation urgent. Rebellion in Ireland, in Pitt’s view, could not be cured simply by the union of the British and Irish parliaments (the Act of Union in 1801). Conciliation, through the political emancipation of the Roman Catholics, was a necessary concomitant of this union. George III believed this proposal to be radical and used all his personal prestige to have emancipation defeated. Pitt resigned in 1801, and the king persuaded Henry Addington (later 1st Viscount Sidmouth) to form a less adventurous cabinet. The collapse of Addington’s government in 1804 after the 10-month Peace of Amiens (1802–1803) brought Pitt back into office (1804–1806), but he returned at the cost of giving up his emancipation proposals. On the death of Pitt in January 1806, the king accepted Fox as foreign secretary in a coalition government (1806–1807). During this short period of Whig administration, the king allowed his ministers to discuss (abortively) peace with Napoleon and to abolish the slave trade; the king asserted himself and forced their resignation only when they dared to propose some amelioration of the laws against Roman Catholics. In 1811, George III was again judged to be severely ill. Parliament again enacted a regency under the Prince of Wales (the future George IV) and decreed that Queen Charlotte should have custody of her husband. The king descended into permanent insanity and died on January 20, 1820, at Windsor Castle. Martin J. Manning

116 | Germain, Lord George

Further Reading Ditchfield, G. M. George III: An Essay in Monarchy. Hampshire, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002. Pares, Richard. King George III and the Politicians. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1988.

Germain, Lord George (1716–1785) Lord George Germain was the secretary of state for the American Department (1775– 1782). He was born George Sackville on June 26, 1716, the third son of the 7th Earl of Sackville and 1st Duke of Dorset. Sackville was educated at Westminster School and Trinity College, Dublin. He then served in several civil posts in Ireland until 1752 and represented Dover in the British Parliament. During this time, he also pursued a military career, acquiring a commission in an Irish regiment. Sackville achieved the rank of lieutenant colonel in 1741 and fought against the French in 1744 during the War of the Austrian Succession (1740–1748). He later saw action in Scotland against the Stuart Uprising before resuming his military service in Europe during 1747–1749. In 1752, Sackville returned to Parliament. Meanwhile, he continued to rise in the army. He was promoted to major general in February 1755, and two years later, he was appointed lieutenant general of ordnance. In June 1758, during the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), he served in an unsuccessful expedition against St. Malo, France. In October 1758, Sackville assumed command of the British army serving under Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick. On August 1, 1759, allied British and German forces repulsed the attack of a French army advancing from Minden. Ferdinand ordered

Sackville, who commanded the cavalry, to attack the retreating enemy. A delay ensued, which allowed the French to reach safety within Minden’s fortifications. Ferdinand complained to his cousin, King George II, that Sackville had cost the allied army a decisive victory. Sackville resigned his command and returned to London, where he was beset by accusations of misconduct and even cowardice. He requested a court-martial, expecting to be acquitted. George II rescinded Sackville’s commission, and after a monthlong trial that began on March 7, the court found Sackville guilty of disobeying orders. Minden haunted Sackville for the rest of his life. Sackville took an active role in Parliament beginning in 1761, although many members shunned him. He began visiting at the court of King George III in 1763 and was gradually accepted there. He also gained influence in Parliament, where he denounced the American colonists’ rejection of Parliament’s sovereignty. In 1769, Sackville received an inheritance from Lady Betty Germain on the condition that he assume her name. He did so and from 1770 was known as Lord George Germain. After the Boston Tea Party (December 16, 1773), Germain urged punitive action against Massachusetts. His speech impressed Prime Minister Lord Frederick North, and by 1775, Germain was considered the most capable supporter of the ministry’s American policy in the House of Commons. Germain’s advocacy for a hard-line American policy, his skill in parliamentary debates, and his reputation for administrative ability prompted North to offer him the American Department, replacing the Earl of Dartmouth. German assumed office on November 10, 1775. Because of the shadow



of Minden, some ministers were reluctant to accept him. Nevertheless, Germain applied himself to his task with zeal. Having gained the full confidence of King George III, Germain possessed virtually sole authority for directing the American war. Germain’s task was immense. In addition to crafting strategy, he had to dispatch and supply the troops in America. This required cooperation with other government departments, which was complicated by a complex bureaucracy and Germain’s difficulty in maintaining good relations with his colleagues. As Germain wished, Major General William Howe was appointed commander in America, and Germain ordered him to open the 1776 campaign with an attack on New York. Because Germain recognized that the distance between London and America made it impossible to provide detailed instructions to his generals, he left them considerable freedom to use their own discretion in military matters. Howe captured New York City in September 1776, but the slow pace of the general’s operations frustrated Germain, as did Major General Sir Guy Carleton’s withdrawal from northern New York that same autumn. Major General John Burgoyne returned to England after Carleton’s New York campaign and proposed an invasion of the colonies from Canada, which the king and ministry approved in February 1777. Germain directed Burgoyne to march to Albany, New York, where he would place himself under Howe’s command. Although Howe had originally proposed to cooperate with Burgoyne, in December 1776, Howe submitted a new plan to capture Philadelphia, and Germain approved it even though it conflicted with Burgoyne’s plan. When Carleton learned that Burgoyne had received command of the invasion

Germain, Lord George | 117

force, he blamed Germain and resigned. Then Howe informed Germain that he intended to attack Philadelphia by sea instead of marching overland as originally planned. Germain reminded Howe of the necessity of cooperating with Burgoyne but to no avail. Howe pledged to keep a corps in New York City, which might then act in support of Burgoyne if conditions allowed. Burgoyne marched south into New York, encountered strong American resistance, and was forced to surrender his army at Saratoga in October 1777. This defeat produced a political crisis. Burgoyne blamed Germain for the disaster, as did the opposition in Parliament. In 1779, Parliament undertook an inquiry into the Saratoga campaign that primarily served as a forum for attacks on Germain and the ministry’s American policy. The military and political situation, along with his wife’s death in January 1778, led Germain to offer his resignation to George III, but the king demurred. Other ministers urged Germain to continue in his post, and he decided to remain. The war now took on an entirely different aspect. It became clear in the wake of Saratoga that France would intervene on the American side and that Spain was likely to follow. Germain thus had to formulate a new strategy for the American war. In June 1778, Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton replaced Howe as commander in chief in America. Germain ordered Clinton to evacuate Philadelphia and send reinforcements to areas threatened by French and Spanish attack and then to begin an offensive in the South. Germain believed that with the aid of Loyalists, the southern provinces could be retaken without large numbers of regular troops. In November 1778, Clinton sent an expedition to Georgia that easily captured

118 | German Forces

Savannah on December 29. This success seemed to validate Germain’s strategy. Clinton led a second expedition to South Carolina that captured Charles Town (Charleston) in May 1780. He then returned to New York with most of the troops, leaving Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis to command in the South. After Cornwallis crushed an American army at Camden on August 16, 1780, Germain expected that the British army would advance and establish control of North Carolina and Virginia. However, Cornwallis failed to subdue American resistance in the Carolinas and in the spring of 1781 marched into Virginia seeking a decisive victory. Germain remained optimistic about the Southern campaign. While awaiting reports from America, he planned the successful operations of Admiral George Rodney in the West Indies and the relief of Gibraltar from a Spanish siege. However, these plans had not yet been carried out when news arrived that Cornwallis had surrendered his army at Yorktown, Virginia, on October 17, 1781. This defeat doomed Germain and led to the fall of North’s ministry. It quickly became clear to Germain that neither Parliament nor the British public wished to continue the American war and that many people held him responsible for the Yorktown debacle. In December 1781, Germain again offered to resign if the king compensated him with a peerage. George III agreed in February 1782, just as the North ministry was collapsing, and conferred on Germain the title of Viscount Sackville. When Sackville first attended the House of Lords, many members asserted that the stain of Minden made him unfit for membership. Sackville won his right to sit in the chamber, but he rarely attended sessions,

preferring to remain on his country estate, where he died on August 26, 1785. Jim Piecuch

Further Reading Brown, Gerald Saxon. The American Secretary: The Colonial Policy of Lord George Germain, 1775–1778. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1963. Valentine, Alan. Lord George Germain. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1962.

German Forces Soldiers contracted by the British Crown with German rulers for service in the British Army during the American War of Independence were often called “Hessians” by the Americans, as almost half of them came from the German state of Hesse-Kassel (Hesse-Cassel). Throughout the conflict, some 30,000 German soldiers discharged this duty, with almost half coming from Hesse-Kassel. The others came from the five principalities of Hesse-Hanau, Waldeck, Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, AnsbachBayreuth, and Anhalt-Zerbst. They composed approximately one-fourth of the forces fielded by the British in the American Revolutionary War. About half were stationed in various British army garrisons to release regular British soldiers to fight battles. The hiring of subsidy forces was not an unusual practice in Europe at this time, and the income derived from the trade in soldiers was a welcome asset for small impecunious states. During the war, Britain paid £1.7 million to the six principalities for the use of their soldiers. Military authorities in Britain were compelled to hire auxiliaries, as they found it



extremely difficult to recruit new soldiers for the war effort because of the great manpower needs of the Royal Navy. Also, the troops were needed quickly. One factor precluding British volunteers from joining the army was harsh service conditions both in camp and during campaigns. Another was that the lower classes, from which recruits usually came, considered the American rebels to be fellow Englishmen and were averse to fighting them. After trying various unsuccessful ways to increase British manpower, the army and the government had no alternative but to turn to auxiliary forces from Germany. The German soldiers who came to America in 1776 had grown up and were trained in a military atmosphere. When German boys turned 7 years old, they were registered for military service, and each year men between the ages of 16 and 30 had to present themselves to a military officer for possible induction into the armed forces. Some men were exempted because their occupations were considered vital to the state. But others, such as the unemployed, vagrants, school dropouts, bankrupts, and servants without masters, were deemed expendable individuals and could be forced into service at any time. Life in the armies of the various German states was harsh. The system was designed to instill iron discipline, and punishments could be brutal. Nevertheless, morale was generally high, and the soldiers took pride in serving their prince and people. Officers, drawn from the higher ranks of society, were well educated, and promotion was by merit. Being in the army provided economic benefits, for the families of soldiers were exempted from some taxes. Army pay was higher than for farmwork, and there was a promise of booty and plunder while on

German Forces | 119

military campaigns. Although looting of noncombatants was officially forbidden, the officers, who also participated in the liberation of civilian property, often looked the other way when it did occur. Americans were alarmed and dismayed by the arrival of German soldiers in America, even more than they were by British troops. They viewed the Crown’s hiring of mercenaries to fight fellow Englishmen as just another example of the tyranny of King George III. Several members of the Continental Congress declared that this act alone was enough to persuade them to favor independence. As a practical matter, the German mercenaries provided American rebels with a handy propaganda tool. Thomas Jefferson, in writing the Declaration of Independence in late June 1776, reminded his “candid” readers that even as he wrote, the king was transporting large numbers of foreign mercenaries to America to complete the work of tyranny that had already been unleashed on the poor colonists. Subsequent German looting of civilian residences and businesses seemed to confirm Jefferson’s dire comments. Despite this anti-German propaganda, however, General George Washington, commander in chief of the Continental Army, and Congress urged the mercenaries to desert and take up free homesteads. Some 12,554 of them accepted the offer. At the beginning of the war, German auxiliary units were organized differently from the British Army. Besides regular infantry regiments, they fielded jägers (riflemen), fusiliers (elite skirmishers), hussars (light cavalrymen), and chasseurs (light infantry). As with the British Army, the basic German military unit was the regiment or battalion. Unlike the British

120 | Germantown, Battle of

regiment, which had 10 companies, the German regiment resembled that of the French Army, with five or six companies and one grenadier company. The grenadiers often were detached to create special shock battalions. Also, the German auxiliaries employed jägers or fusiliers as needed. Initially, the German battle formation was three lines, or ranks, whereas the British line was two ranks. Upon learning that American fighting conditions required more battlefield flexibility, the Germans quickly adopted the British two-line formation. But they never adopted the British quick march, despite being criticized for being too slow in deploying for battle. German auxiliary troops took part in practically every major engagement of the war. They fought for no ideological principles. Neither the officers nor the soldiers knew much of or cared about the causes of the war, and what they did know was colored by British views. They had been told that the Americans were rebels who refused obedience to their lawful king. Now that the Germans had been hired by this same king, they were obliged to fight against these benighted people. Since childhood, they had been imbued with a sense of honor and a respect for authority. But in America, they fought for a cause to which they gave no allegiance. As Lieutenant General Baron Wilhelm von Knyphausen famously said of them, they were a hireling army upon which a judicious officer could place little reliance, and during a campaign their numbers dwindled less by death than by desertion. As the conflict wore on, German prisoners of war became something of a problem for the Americans. One thousand German troops were captured at Trenton, and after Burgoyne’s defeat in New York, about 4,000 more were added. Billeted at Cambridge, Massachusetts, and other places, they were

a serious drain on the rebels’ already scarce supplies. Thousands of them, with the tacit consent of General Washington and the civilian authorities, were allowed to escape. At the end of the war, despite the allure of bounties, employment, and American freedoms, two-thirds of the German auxiliaries chose to return home. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Atwood, Rodney. The Hessians: Mercenaries from Hessen-Kassel in the American Revolution. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1980. Crytzer, Brady J. Hessians: Mercenaries, Rebels, and the War for British North America. Yardley, PA: Westholme, 2015. Eelking, Max von, ed. Memoirs, Letters and Journals, of Major General Riedesel. 2 vols. Albany, NY: J. Munsell, 1868. Ewald, Johann. Diary of the American War: A Hessian Journal. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1979. Lowell, Edward J. The Hessians and the Other German Auxiliaries of Great Britain in the Revolutionary War. 1884. Reprint, Williamstown, MA: Corner House, 1975.

Germantown, Battle of (October 4, 1777) The natural consequence of the Battle of Brandywine (September 11, 1777) was the British occupation of Philadelphia. Following marching and countermarching and the threat of yet another major engagement, British forces under General Sir William Howe entered the half-deserted city on September 26. Three thousand British troops occupied Philadelphia; the remaining 9,000 established camp outside the city, most of them at Germantown, five miles to the north. Meanwhile, Vice Admiral Lord Richard



Howe set about destroying the American naval forces on the Delaware River that had obliged his brother to approach the city by way of the Chesapeake. Howe’s seizure of Philadelphia was a hollow British victory. Capturing the Patriot capital did not bring him the masses of Loyalists for which Howe had hoped. It also tied down his forces there. When Benjamin Franklin in Paris was informed that Howe had taken Philadelphia, he is said to have remarked that it would be more proper to say that “Philadelphia has captured General Howe.” Also, Lieutenant General John Burgoyne was about to lose an entire British army in northern New York. Continental Army commander in chief general George Washington now decided to attempt a surprise descent on Howe’s main encampment at Germantown. Howe foolishly discounted the possibility of an American attack and had not bothered to entrench his forces. On September 28, Washington met with his generals at Pennypacker’s Mills, Pennsylvania. Earlier that same day, word had arrived at Washington’s headquarters of a major engagement to the north between British and American forces at Saratoga with reports of heavy British casualties. Ten of the 18 generals present in this council of war voted against an immediate attack. They urged instead that the army be moved to within a dozen miles of Germantown and there await reinforcements, which were soon expected. Washington concurred, and soon the army was under way. On October 3, Washington summoned another conference and informed his generals that Howe had weakened his forces by sending men to operate against American fortifications on the Delaware. Some 8,500– 9,000 British troops under Hessian lieutenant general Wilhelm von Knyphausen were at Germantown. With reinforcements following

Germantown, Battle of | 121

the Battle of Brandywine, Washington would have 11,000 men, although 3,000 of these were militia. This time the generals concurred, voting unanimously in favor of an attack. As it turned out, Washington’s plan was too complicated for his largely untrained forces to execute. It called for four columns to advance independently and each to converge on Germantown and attack the British from a different direction. The forces were to move to their attack positions during the night of October 3–4. Night movements are notoriously difficult to execute, even for a well-trained force, and Washington’s army certainly was not that. The precise coordination required was simply beyond its abilities. The Americans left camp at dusk on October 3. There were two flanking columns of militia and two center columns of Continentals. Major General Nathanael Greene commanded the leftmost Continental corps that would come in from the north, consisting of divisions under Major General Adam Stephen and Brigadier General Alexander McDougall: some 5,000 men, more than half of the Continental Army force. Washington accompanied the rightmost corps under Major General John Sullivan that would come in from the northwest. Sullivan had his own division and those of Brigadier Generals Thomas Conway and Anthony Wayne, with troops under Major General William Alexander, Lord Stirling, in reserve. A major problem was that each of the columns would have different distances to travel. Greene’s was the longest—about 19 miles—while the other three each had to march about 15 miles. Washington’s plan called for the three columns to reach their staging areas about 2:00 a.m. and then pause there for two hours, with the attack to commence at 4:00 a.m.

122 | Germantown, Battle of

All columns fell behind schedule. The two flanking columns of militia on the extreme left and right never got into the fight. On the left, some 1,100 Maryland militia under Brigadier General William Smallwood became confused in the fog. Those on the right, Major General John Armstrong Sr.’s column of 1,500 Pennsylvania militia, moved south along the Ridge Pike to Wissahickon Creek, near where it joins the Schuylkill River, but went no farther, being content to lob a few artillery shells across the Wissahickon into the British camp. This meant that the Continental Army units had to bear the battle alone, and only Sullivan’s column was in place by 2:00 a.m. With farther to move and handicapped by heavy fog, Greene’s guides lost their way, and the men then had to retrace their steps for four miles. Meanwhile, Tories in the area alerted the British to the Patriot movements. Washington, who was with Sullivan, assumed that the other columns were in place, but when the battle began at dawn, Sullivan’s division and Wayne’s brigade had to engage the British alone for about 45 minutes in heavy fog before Greene’s men finally joined the fight. Nonetheless, the Americans drove back a British light infantry battalion along the Skippack Road toward the main British camp. The British took up positions in and around the two-foot-thick stone walls of the Chew House in central Germantown and other stone dwellings, which proved largely impervious to American small-arms and even artillery fire. Wayne’s men pressed forward, but the chief of artillery, Brigadier General Henry Knox, convinced Washington, when the latter came up, that they needed to take the Chew House rather than leave a fortress position in the American rear. Washington then ordered Brigadier

General William Maxwell’s New Jersey brigade to assault the Chew House position. The British held, despite American assaults that resulted in at least 70 Americans killed and many more wounded in the attempt to take it. Nonetheless, the American advance was still proceeding when, at the critical point in the battle, Greene’s men at last arrived. Greene sent forward Stephen’s division, but in the morning fog and thick smoke of the battle, this unit, hindered by the fact that its commander was inebriated, got off course; instead of converging with the remainder of Greene’s force, they mistook Wayne’s men for British soldiers and opened fire on them. Convinced that the troops firing on them were British, Wayne’s soldiers returned fire and then, almost out of ammunition, broke and ran back past the Chew House. Carrying other American units along with them, they exposed Conway’s left flank and allowed the British to rally. Meanwhile, Brigadier General John Muhlenberg’s Virginians employed the bayonet against the British in the town meetinghouse and took 100 prisoners, but they had advanced too far and were then cut off. With all their officers wounded and completely surrounded, the regiment was forced to surrender. At this point, Major General Lord Charles Cornwallis arrived with reinforcements, who had double-timed from Philadelphia, while Washington, Sullivan, and Wayne rallied their men. Greene, unaware of what had transpired, continued his advance, but his men were now isolated. When Greene became aware of events, he placed his men so as to cover the other American units. At about 9:00 a.m., the British launched a successful counterattack, and Greene had no choice but to fall back. Howe pursued



Grasse-Tilly, François-Joseph-Paul, Comte de | 123

the Americans about five miles back up the Germantown Pike, but the British pursuit ground to a halt at sunset thanks to poor roads and the actions of Greene’s infantry, Wayne’s artillery, and a cavalry detachment under Polish count Casimir Pulaski. The Americans then returned to their own camp. The battle had lasted some three hours. American losses were 152 killed, 521 wounded, and about 400 taken prisoner. British losses were half those of the Americans: 71 killed, 450 wounded, and 14 missing. Although the militia had again performed poorly, Washington could at least be pleased that the Continentals had fought well, until they were fired on by their own men. The Americans had also returned with all their guns. Following the battle, Washington promptly cashiered Stephen. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Leckie, Robert. George Washington’s War; The Saga of the American Revolution. New York: HarperCollins, 1992. McGuire, Thomas J. The Philadelphia Campaign. Vol. 2, Germantown and the Roads to Valley Forge. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole, 2006. Tucker, Spencer C. Rise and Fight Again: The Life of General Nathanael Greene. Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2009. Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. Vol. 1. New York: Macmillan, 1952.

Grasse-Tilly, François-JosephPaul, Comte de(1722–1788) Born into the French nobility on September 13, 1722, at Bar-sur-Loup (AlpesMaritimes), France, François-Joseph-Paul de Grasse-Tilly, began studies in 1733 at the

Compagnie des Gardes, Toulon. He was a good student. In July 1734, he was appointed page to the grand master of the Knights of Malta. Maltese ships convoyed vessels in the Mediterranean and fought the Barbary pirates. At age 15, de Grasse joined the order as a knight of Malta. He served in the navy of the order until 1737. In 1738, de Grasse joined the French Navy and served in the Levant on the École. Two years later, he transferred to the Ferme in the Antilles. During the War of the Austrian Succession (1740–1748), he was promoted to ensign in October 1743 on the Diamant and took part in the capture of a British corvette off Acadia. In 1747, he shipped on the Gloire (40 guns), which took part in the sanguinary First Battle of Cape Finisterre (May 3, 1747). The Gloire was captured, and de Grasse was wounded and taken prisoner; 75 of its crew were killed in the fight, including the captain. Exchanged later in 1747, de Grasse served on the Junon in the Levant in 1752 and was promoted to lieutenant in May 1754. He was then at Saint Dominica on the Amphion in 1755 and on the Tonnant at Isle Royale in 1757 during the defense of Louisbourg in the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763). In 1757, he commanded the Zéphyr off Africa. Promoted to captain in January 1762, de Grasse commanded the Protée in 1763 in the Antilles and the Héroïne in 1765. In 1772, he had command of the Iris; in 1775, the Amphitrite; and the next year, the Intrépide. Having gained a reputation as a skilled seaman, de Grasse was appointed commodore in June 1778 following France’s entry into the American Revolutionary War the previous March. He commanded the Robuste in the inconclusive First Battle of Ushant (July 27, 1778). Under Vice Admiral Jean Baptiste Charles Henri Hector, comte d’Estaing, de Grasse participated in fighting

124 | Grasse-Tilly, François-Joseph-Paul, Comte de

off Grenada in July 1779 and at Savannah, Georgia, in August–October 1779. In 1780, de Grasse commanded a division in the squadron commanded by Admiral Luc Urbain de Bouëxic, comte de Guichen, and distinguished himself in three battles with British admiral George Brydges Rodney off Dominica in April 1780. In poor health, de Grasse returned to France to recuperate. Promoted to lieutenant general (rear admiral) in March 1781, de Grasse assumed command of the West Indies Squadron. Raising his flag on the Ville de Paris, he departed Brest for the Antilles in March with 20 ships of the line, other smaller warships, and a large convoy. On April 5, he detached a heavy frigate and 30 supply ships to sail to Newport, Rhode Island, with supplies and reinforcements for French forces in America. After an inconclusive engagement on April 28–29, 1781, de Grasse got by a British fleet of 17 ships under Admiral Samuel Hood and reached Fort Royal, Martinique. De Grasse then mounted an unsuccessful attack against St. Lucia, but on July 1, his forces seized the island of Tobago. With the approach of hurricane season, de Grasse took his fleet north with three regiments of troops and supplies to aid French and Continental Army forces in operations against British forces at Yorktown, Virginia. De Grasse entered Chesapeake Bay on August 30, 1781, and landed his troops. On September 5, with 28 ships of the line, he engaged a British fleet of 19 ships of the line under Admiral Thomas Graves in the Second Battle of the Chesapeake. While the fighting was tactically indecisive, it was one of the most strategically important battles in world history, as it left the French in control of the bay. This hold was solidified by the arrival of eight

additional ships of the line under Admiral Louis Jacques comte de Barras de SaintLaurent. British land forces at Yorktown were then obliged to surrender, bringing down the government in London and leading to peace talks that ended the American Revolutionary War. Returning with his fleet to Martinique in November, during February 1782, de Grasse took St. Christopher (St. Kitts) and Montserrat, but he failed to prevent the escape of Rear Admiral Sir Samuel Hood’s squadron from St. Kitts. On April 8, de Grasse sailed from Martinique with 35 ships of the line for an assault on Jamaica but was defeated by a fleet of 36 British ships of the line under Vice Admiral George Brydges Rodney and Hood in the Battle of the Saintes (April 12, 1782). In the battle, de Grasse’s flagship, the Ville de Paris, was among the French ships taken, and the admiral was made a prisoner and taken to Britain, where he played a role in discussions to end the war. Unable to forget his defeat in the Battle of the Saintes, on his return to France, de Grasse wrote several pamphlets placing blame on his subordinates, most notably Louis-Antoine de Bougainville, who had failed to obey orders. The controversy grew intense, and eventually King Louis XVI convened a council of war to investigate the charges. This tribunal at Lorient in 1784 heard 222 witnesses. It acquitted de Grasse and imposed sentences on some of his subordinates, including Bougainville. De Grasse died in Paris on January 11, 1788. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Clowes, William Laird. The Royal Navy: A History from the Earliest Times to the Present. Vol. 3. London: Sampson Low, Marston, 1898.

Lewis, Charles L. Admiral De Grasse and American Independence. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1945. Taillimite, Étienne. Dictionnaire des marins français. Rev. ed. Paris: Tallanider, 2002. Tournquist, Carl G. The Naval Campaigns of Count de Grasse during the American Revolution, 1781–1783. Translated by Amandus Johnson. Philadelphia: Swedish Colonial Society, 1942.

Greene, Nathanael(1742–1786) Born in Potowomut (Warwick), Rhode Island, on July 27, 1742, and raised a Quaker, Nathanael Greene had little formal education, but from his own love of reading, he became well educated by the standards of the day. In 1770, Greene assumed management of the family-owned ironworks and other businesses. He served in the Rhode Island General Assembly during 1771–1774. A mutual interest in military affairs led to a friendship with Henry Knox and caused Greene to help establish a militia unit, the Kentish Guards, in 1774. Because Greene walked with a slight limp as a result of a birth defect, the men refused to elect him an officer, and so he enlisted as a private. A staunch Patriot, Greene was an early believer that America must be independent of Britain. Several days after the beginning of the American Revolutionary War, on April 19, 1775, the Rhode Island General Assembly selected Greene as one of two commissioners to meet with Connecticut representatives concerning a common defense. The General Assembly also ordered the raising of a brigade of 1,500 men. After others had turned down the post and although he had no military experience, Greene was named its commander.

Greene, Nathanael | 125

Greene led his brigade in the siege of Boston (April 19, 1775–March 17, 1776). Congress confirmed Greene as a brigadier general in the Continental Army in June 1775, and Greene quickly distinguished himself. He was soon one of Continental Army commander general George Washington’s closest advisers and came to be regarded as the man most likely to succeed Washington if something should happen to the commander in chief. Ordered with his brigade to New York in April 1776, Greene helped prepare defenses on Long Island but took ill and was absent during the Battle of Long Island on August 27. Advanced to major general that same month, Greene saw his first action in the

Continental Army major general Nathanael Greene was arguably, next to George Washington, the greatest American military leader of the War of Independence. Ironically, prior to the conflict, his only military experience was a brief service as a private in the Rhode Island militia. (National Archives)

126 | Greene, Nathanael

Battle of Harlem Heights on September 16. Following the withdrawal of most of the Continental Army forces from New York to New Jersey, Greene urged retention of Fort Washington on the New York side of the Hudson, an unfortunate decision in which Washington concurred; it led to one of the worst Continental Army defeats of the war on November 16. Greene commanded Fort Lee, on the New Jersey side of the Hudson, but escaped with his garrison just ahead of a British attacking force on November 20, 1776. He played an important role in the battles at Trenton (December 26, 1776) and Princeton (January 3, 1777), and he led the principal Continental Army column at Germantown on October 4, 1777. On Washington’s urging, Greene reluctantly accepted appointment as quartermaster general of the army. In this position, he rendered highly effective and absolutely essential service during March 1778–July 1780, but he chafed to return to line duties. Greene commanded the right wing in the Battle of Monmouth Court House on June 28, 1778, and took part in the Battle of Newport, Rhode Island, on August 29. Following the treason of Major General Benedict Arnold in 1780, Greene took command of West Point. Following Major General Horatio Gates’s disastrous defeat in the South in the Battle of Camden (August 16, 1780), Washington named Greene as Gates’s successor. Greene found the army in the South both vastly outnumbered and wretchedly equipped. He then adopted the risky tactic of dividing his forces while he retrained and rebuilt his army. He also made highly effective use of militia forces. Following Brigadier General Daniel Morgan’s victory in the Battle of Cowpens (January 17, 1781), Greene led a brilliant, long withdrawal across North

Carolina and over the Dan River into Virginia, escaping pursuing British forces under Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis. Following subsequent extensive maneuvering, Greene engaged Cornwallis in battle at Guilford Courthouse, North Carolina, on March 15, 1781. Although Greene was defeated, heavy British losses in the battle led Cornwallis to shift his operations to Virginia, culminating in his surrender at Yorktown (October 19). Greene meanwhile went on the offensive but suffered a rebuff against forces under British lieutenant colonel Lord Francis Rawdon, the British field commander in the South, in the Battle of Hobkirk’s Hill, South Carolina (April 25, 1781). This battle prompted Greene to remark, “We fight, get beat, rise, and fight again.” Greene was next forced to break off a siege of the British outpost at Ninety Six and retreat (June 20). Although Greene did not win a battle during the period of April–July 1781, he effectively utilized guerrilla units and forced the British from all of Georgia and South Carolina, with the exception of Savannah and the area around Charles Town (Charleston). In late August, Greene, now reinforced, attacked Rawdon’s successor, Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Stewart, in the Battle of Eutaw Springs (September 8). Stewart was so weakened by this hardest fought of all southern battles of the war that he was obliged to withdraw to the environs of Charles Town, which Greene occupied following the British evacuation in December 1782. Considered one of the finest generals on the American side in the war, second only to Washington, Greene was a superb organizer, trainer of men, and administrator. Indefatigable and a stern taskmaster, he was fair and concerned about his men’s welfare.



Certainly, he was highly regarded by them. He was also a brilliant strategist, and his Southern campaign remains an American military masterpiece. Following the war, Greene retired from the military to Mulberry Grove, an estate north of Savannah that was presented to him by the Georgia legislature for his services in the war. He died of sunstroke on June 19, 1786, at only 43 years old. Had he not died so young, Greene might have played a prominent role in the new republic. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Alderman, Clifford Lindsey. Retreat to Victory: The Life of Nathanael Greene. Philadelphia: Chilton Books, 1967. Golway, Terry. Washington’s General: Nathanel Greene and the Triumph of the American Revolution. New York: Henry Holt, 2005. Thane, Elswyth. The Fighting Quaker: Nathanael Greene. New York: Hawthorn Books, 1972. Tucker, Spencer C. Rise and Fight Again: The Life of General Nathanael Greene. Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2009.

Guilford Courthouse, Battle of (March 15, 1781) In March 1781, Major General Nathanael Greene, the Continental Army commander in the South, having reunited his army’s two main bodies, sought out British forces in North Carolina under Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis. On paper, Greene had the superior force: 4,404 men, including 4,243 infantry and 161 cavalry. This advantage was deceptive, however, as only a third of his men (1,490) were Continental Army troops, and only about 500 of these

Guilford Courthouse, Battle of | 127

were trained veterans. Cornwallis had only 1,900 men, but all were regulars, mostly disciplined veterans who were steady under fire. Greene chose as a battlefield position a sparsely settled country just west of Guilford Courthouse, a North Carolina backcountry hamlet that he had previously reconnoitered. He broke camp at Speedwell Iron Works on Troublesome Creek on the morning of March 14 and arrived at Guilford Courthouse that afternoon. Cornwallis was then some 10 miles to the southwest. Greene expected a British attack the next day and moved up New Garden Road. He planned to defend a stretch of gradually rising terrain astride that road, forcing the British to attack him uphill and employing the same tactic that had worked so well in the Battle of Cowpens, positioning forces in three ranks, with the militia in front. However, forested terrain made it impossible for Greene to see the first two ranks from his command position at the third line. About half a mile west of Guilford Courthouse, Little Horseshoe Creek flowed in a more or less north–south direction. East of it lay open fields, and behind these were a rail fence and woods. Behind the fence line, Greene placed some 1,000 North Carolina militia, his least trained men, instructing them to fire off two rounds at the advancing British before falling back. Virginia militia formed the second rank, about 300–400 yards farther back and in the woods. Many of these men had previously served in the Continental Army. The final line was about 400 yards beyond, at the top of a rise just before Guilford Courthouse. It consisted of the 1,400man Continental Line: two regiments from Maryland and two from Virginia. Finally, Greene placed covering forces in the woods to each side of his lines.

128 | Guilford Courthouse, Battle of

There was no reserve. Greene had no intention of placing his army in jeopardy. If prudence required, he planned to withdraw north up Reedy Fork Road to Salisbury. March 15 dawned bright and clear. Before first light, a courier informed Greene that Cornwallis was indeed moving against him. The British arrived shortly after noon, and Cornwallis immediately formed a line with a brigade on each side of the road and no reserve, a move demonstrating contempt for his opponent. The battle opened almost immediately with American artillery fire and the British replying. Following a 20-minute cannonade with little damage to either side, Cornwallis ordered his infantry forward. Too soon, with the British still about 150 yards or so from their fence line, the North Carolina militia opened a ragged fire. Although dozens of British soldiers fell, the vast majority continued on. At about 50 yards, the British halted and delivered a volley of their own before charging with the bayonet. The North Carolina militiamen promptly fled into the woods, many simply throwing down their weapons as they attempted to escape. Unfortunately for Greene, most of the militia did not join the Virginians but simply decamped altogether. As Greene anticipated, the woods broke up the British formations, and the battle became fragmented, with small groups engaging one another. The Virginia militia fought well, but after about a half hour of fierce combat and several bayonet attacks, the British finally broke through the second American line and emerged from the woods, only to encounter an open, fenced field and the third American line. A well-aimed volley and an American counterattack with the bayonet drove the British back and into the woods again. This was the critical point in the battle. Greene

might have ordered the Continental Line forward, but this chance at total victory carried with it the risk of the destruction of his entire force, something he was not prepared to hazard. Greene ordered the Continentals to hold their positions, and the British left was thus able to regroup. Greene rode up and down the American line, encouraging his men and in the process exposing himself to British fire. It appeared that the Americans might carry the day, but on the British right/ American left, things were going differently. The British managed to break through the 2nd Maryland Regiment, a unit experiencing its first battle, and turned the American left. Many of the Marylanders fled without firing a shot. Disaster was averted when Lieutenant Colonel John Eager Howard’s 1st Maryland Regiment wheeled and hit the advancing British in the flank and Lieutenant Colonel William Washington rode forward with his cavalry to strike the British from the rear. To halt the American advance and stave off disaster, Cornwallis, whose horse had been shot from under him and who had only narrowly escaped capture, ordered his artillery to fire grapeshot to disperse Washington’s cavalry. This and the appearance of other British troops who had just overcome the last of the Virginia militia in the woods caused Howard to halt the melee. This action killed as many British troops as it did Americans, but it had the intended effect of breaking up the American counterattack. The outcome of the battle was still in doubt, but Greene refused to hazard his army. The gap in his line convinced him that he should order a retreat and preserve the bulk of his force. With most of the teams killed before the retreat began, the Americans were forced to abandon their guns and two ammunition wagons. The men then



moved north up Reedy Creek Road, with Howard’s Marylanders providing rearguard protection. Although the British initially pursued the Americans, they soon gave it up. The next day, under a flag of truce, both sides cared for their wounded and buried the dead. In the battle, the Americans had sustained 264 casualties: 79 killed and 185 wounded, more than half of them militia. Another 294 militia were listed as missing. Most of these had simply deserted and returned home. British casualties were much higher: 93 killed and 439 wounded, a number of them mortally. This amounted to a quarter of the force engaged. Cornwallis reported a victory in glowing terms, but when it was announced to Parliament, opposition leader Charles James Fox responded by paraphrasing ancient King Pyrrhus of Epirus: “Another such victory would ruin the British army.” Horace Walpole gave an even gloomier assessment, saying that the battle showed that the war was lost. Despite his report, Cornwallis was frustrated by Greene’s brand of war, writing

Guilford Courthouse, Battle of | 129

that he was “quite tired of marching about the country in quest of adventures.” He now decided to withdraw to the coast and refit, then move the bulk of his force north into Virginia, where he hoped he could cut Greene’s supply line. This decision set up the Battle of Yorktown, which turned out to be the climactic engagement of the war. Meanwhile, Greene’s forces came to control virtually all the interior of North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Babits, Lawrence E., and Joshua B. Howard. Long, Obstinate, and Bloody: The Battle of Guilford Courthouse. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2009. Davis, Burke. The Cowpens-Guilford Courthouse Campaign. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002. Tucker, Spencer C. Rise and Fight Again: The Life of General Nathanael Greene. Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2009. Ward, Christopher. War of the Revolution. 2 vols. New York: MacMillan, 1952.

H Howe, Richard, 1st Earl Howe (1726–1799)

locations, with his greatest success at Cherbourg. In 1759, Howe served in the blockade of Brest and played a major role in the Battle of Quiberon Bay (November 20), where his ship captured a French vessel and caused another to sink. In 1762, Howe joined the Admiralty Board and was later appointed treasurer of the navy (1765). He served in this position until 1770. Although the opportunity was present, Howe refused to profit from his position. Promoted to rear admiral in 1770 and to vice admiral in 1775, Howe received command of the North America Station on February 6, 1776. His brother, General Sir William Howe, then commanded the British Army forces in the American Revolutionary War. Richard Howe was a Whig by inclination, and some have alleged that he influenced his younger brother toward moderation and efforts at reconciliation with the rebellious colonies, thereby missing the opportunity to crush the revolution early on. Certainly, as a member of Parliament, Howe had urged moderation on the government and had even attempted to negotiate with the Americans through colonial leader Benjamin Franklin before the latter departed London in 1775. Howe was also appointed a peace commissioner to treat with the rebellious colonists on behalf of the Crown. Although he was able to get his brother William named as the other peace commissioner, he was unable to substantially mitigate the negotiating terms, which basically required that

Richard Howe, 1st Earl Howe, was a British admiral and commander of the North American station during 1776–1778. He was born on March 8, 1726, in London into a military family with close connections to the royal family and entered the navy as a midshipman at age 13 in 1739; his elder brother George (killed in battle in 1758 during the French and Indian War, 1754–1763) and younger brother William both joined the army. Nicknamed “Black Dick,” for his dark complexion, Richard Howe enjoyed rapid promotion. Although this was in part because of family connections, even his critics agree that Howe’s professional credentials were never questioned. Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson called Howe “our great Master in naval tactics and bravery.” Known as a strict disciplinarian, Howe also enjoyed an excellent relationship with his sailors and seems to have been popular with them. Howe was advanced to lieutenant in 1745 and received his first command that November. After becoming a post captain in April 1746, he served in the West Indies, the coast of Guinea, and the Mediterranean during the next six years. Elected to the House of Commons in 1757 for the Admiraltycontrolled seat of Dartmouth, he held that seat until 1782, when he became an English peer. In 1758, during the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), Howe commanded the naval element of a force numbering 15,000 men and 150 vessels with orders to raid the French coast. He landed soldiers at several 131

132 | Howe, Richard, 1st Earl Howe

the war be won by the British before meaningful talks could be held. Howe’s threat to resign and take his brother William along with him only led to the Howes being able to issue pardons and amnesties but not make any substantive concessions beyond the pledge of further discussions of colonial grievances, condemning the peace effort to certain failure. Howe sailed for North America on May 11, 1776, and arrived at New York on July 12, only to be presented by his brother with a copy of the recently signed Declaration of Independence. Although William now believed that a military solution was the only answer, Richard finally convinced him to attempt negotiations; however, peace talks accomplished nothing, with Congress refusing to entertain any proposals that did not include independence. With the failure of the peace initiative, the Howe brothers opted for a military solution. Richard Howe’s orders called for him to secure the American coast, capture any American ship encountered, and destroy any port defying the British. He duly supported his brother’s New York campaign of 1776 and the securing of Newport, Rhode Island, as an ice-free winter port for the British fleet while also neutralizing much of the Continental Navy and American privateers in Narragansett Bay. In December 1776, the Howes angered Loyalists and the ministry in London when they issued a proclamation that promised to pardon and guarantee the property of anyone who within the next 60 days pledged loyalty to the Crown. After he learned of it, the secretary of state for America, Lord George Germain, informed the brothers that they had overstepped their authority. Richard then assisted his brother in executing the Philadelphia campaign (July 1777– July 1778). This meant refusing to actively

cooperate with Lieutenant General John Burgoyne’s invasion of upper New York from Canada and included mounting an extraordinarily large and complex amphibious operation and, once Philadelphia had been secured, opening the Delaware River to British shipping. The British capture of Philadelphia in September 1777 did not turn out as the Howes had hoped, for the Continental Army had not been destroyed; indeed, Burgoyne was forced to surrender at Saratoga, New York (October 17, 1777). There was now much criticism of the Howe brothers from both sides of the Atlantic. William Howe tendered his resignation in December 1777, and Richard planned to travel to London, largely to defend his brother but with the excuse of reasons of health. First Lord of the Admiralty John Montague, 4th Earl of Sandwich, agreed that Howe could return home, but only when James Gambier, promoted to rear admiral and named Howe’s second-in-command, had arrived in North America. Knowing that Gambier was regarded as incompetent and that being replaced by him would be taken as a disgrace, Howe chose to stay on even after Gambier had arrived. This decision was buttressed by news from London that French vice admiral Jean Baptiste Charles Henri Hector, comte d’Estaing, had sailed with a powerful fleet, possibly for North America. By early July, Howe had successfully evacuated British forces withdrawn by his brother’s successor, Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton, from Philadelphia to New York. Howe was fortunate in being able to accomplish this just before d’Estaing’s arrival. Initially, the French ships outgunned those of the British, 850 guns to 534, but British reinforcements subsequently brought the disparity to 850 to 772. The two fleets then maneuvered against one another for the next month. Weather



interceded in the form of a hurricane, and no general engagement occurred. Howe officially resigned in frustration on September 11, 1778, but had not yet departed when his successor, Vice Admiral John Byron, arrived on September 25. Howe arrived in England on October 25, 1778. Whatever his shortcomings, Howe was certainly the best of the British naval commanders in North American waters during the American Revolutionary War. For the next few years, Howe remained unemployed until the leadership in Parliament changed in 1782. He then received command of the Channel Fleet, promotion to admiral, and an English peerage. In September 1782, Howe led a major relief expedition to Gibraltar consisting of 186 ships, including 34 ships of the line. Arriving in October, he maneuvered his ships past the Franco-Spanish fleet into the anchorage at Gibraltar and then escorted the empty transports out of danger. Howe offered battle, but the allies refused. As first lord of the admiralty during 1783–1788, Howe supervised the reduction of the British fleet following the American Revolutionary War and was created an earl. At the outbreak of hostilities with France in 1793, he assumed command of the Channel Fleet and defeated the French in the Battle of the Glorious First of June in 1794, sinking one ship and capturing six. In 1795, because of his poor health, he received extended leave to recuperate at Bath. Howe was promoted to admiral of the fleet in March 1796, and his presence proved instrumental in ending the Spithead Mutiny in 1797. Following this, he resigned but suffered continual attacks of gout. Persuaded that electricity would remedy his complaint, he underwent a treatment that resulted in his death at Bath on August 5, 1799. Kevin D. McCranie and Spencer C. Tucker

Howe, William, 5th Viscount | 133

Further Reading Barrow, John. The Life of Richard, Earl Howe, K. G., Admiral of the Fleet, and General of Marines. London: John Murray, 1838. Gruber, Ira. The Howe Brothers and the American Revolution. New York: Atheneum, 1972. Le Fevre, Peter. Precursors of Nelson: British Admirals of the Eighteenth Century. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole, 2000. Syrett, David. Admiral Lord Howe: A Biography. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2006.

Howe, William, 5th Viscount (1729–1814) British Army officer and commander of British and Hessian forces in America during 1775–1778, William Howe was born in England on August 10, 1729, the younger brother of George Augustus Howe, 3rd Viscount Howe, who died in the Fort Ticonderoga Expedition of 1758, and of Richard, 4th Viscount Howe and afterward Earl Howe, who as an admiral commanded Royal Navy forces in North American waters during the American Revolutionary War. William Howe’s grandmother was an illegitimate daughter of King George I, so, in effect, Howe was an uncle of King George III. Court connections may have played a role in the advancement of the Howe brothers, yet all three were regarded as quite capable. Educated by private tutors, William Howe then attended Eton. In September 1746, he entered the cavalry. With the purchase of commissions, a common practice at the time, he became a lieutenant in 1747, a captain lieutenant in 1749, and a captain of the 20th Regiment of Foot in 1750. In 1756, he was a major in the 58th Regiment of

134 | Howe, William, 5th Viscount

Foot, and in 1757, at age 27, he was that regiment’s lieutenant colonel. Howe fought in North America during the French and Indian War (1754–1763, also known as the Seven Years’ War, 1756– 1763). He was respected by his men for his leadership abilities and concern for their welfare and commanded his regiment in the capture of Louisbourg in 1758. During Major General James Wolfe’s expedition to Quebec, Howe distinguished himself at the head of a composite light infantry battalion, leading the advance party that scaled the Heights of Abraham and securing them to make possible Wolfe’s victory in the Battle of the Plains of Abraham (Quebec) on September 13, 1759. Howe commanded his own regiment in the defense of Quebec during 1759–1760 and led a brigade in the capture of Montreal (September 8, 1760). Returning to Europe, he took part in the siege of Belle Isle, France, in 1761, and the siege and capture of Havana, Cuba, in 1762. In 1764, he became colonel of the 46th Regiment of Foot stationed in Ireland, and in 1768, he was appointed lieutenant governor of the Isle of Wight. Howe was now regarded as one of the most experienced officers in the British Army. In 1758, Howe replaced his brother George Augustus Howe as the representative for Nottingham in Parliament, a position he held until 1780, although he was little interested in politics. In 1772, William Howe became a major general, and in 1774, he was entrusted with the training of light infantry companies on Salisbury Plain. In letters to his constituents, Howe declared his opposition to Britain’s North American policies and even went so far as to say that he would not command troops there. However, in 1774, he informed his constituents that one could not refuse to

serve one’s country and let the government know that he would go to Boston as secondin-command to Lieutenant General Thomas Gage. Howe arrived in Boston on May 25, 1775, along with Major Generals John Burgoyne and Henry Clinton and British troop reinforcements. It was Howe who formulated the plan of attack on Patriot militia forces fortifying Breed’s Hill and Bunker Hill and led the British troops there in the Battle of Bunker Hill (June 17, 1775). Although he demonstrated great personal courage in the battle, Howe’s plan was faulty, and he also made the major mistake of holding his opponents in contempt and committing his forces to an uphill charge against an entrenched foe. Although the British ultimately carried the day, it was at horrific cost, with about half the attacking force killed or wounded. No doubt the heavy casualties here were a factor in Howe’s subsequent failures to press home attacks. With Gage’s departure for England on October 10, 1775, Howe was promoted to lieutenant general, with the local rank of general, and took over the command of British forces in the war. Howe directed the British defense during the Siege of Boston, where the British remained, owing to a lack of transports (April 19, 1775–March 17, 1776). With the placement of American artillery on Dorchester Heights, the British position became untenable, and Howe evacuated the city on March 17 and sailed for Halifax unmolested under the understanding with Continental Army commander general George Washington that the British would not destroy Boston. After reorganizing his forces in Halifax, Howe and his brother vice admiral Lord Richard Howe sailed for New York with some 32,000 British and German troops.



On July 2, they took Staten Island and then used it for a staging area against New York. However, William Howe’s offensive was at best dilatory. On August 27, Howe’s forces smashed the American defenses in the Battle of Long Island. Clinton wanted a continued pursuit, but Howe, uncertain as to the strength of the defenders, demurred. Consequently, Washington was able to evacuate his men to Manhattan. Howe then sought to outflank Washington in New York City, landing at Kips Bay (September 15) but failing to trap Washington’s forces as he had hoped. Washington was able to escape northward, standing at Harlem Heights (September 16). Another Howe effort to trap Washington—a landing at Pell’s Point (October 18)—went awry, and Washington again moved northward. Howe then defeated Washington in the Battle of White Plains (October 28), but, again, Washington was able to withdraw. Howe then turned southward and on November 16 took the American bastion of Fort Washington on the east bank of the Hudson, which Washington had foolishly decided to hold. Howe had achieved important territorial gains with few casualties, but the hope of the Howe brothers that the Americans would see reason and give up the fight was illusory. William Howe then pursued Washington westward through New Jersey, and on December 6, Clinton captured Aquidneck Island (Rhode Island) and its important seaport of Newport. The American victories at Trenton (December 26, 1776) and Princeton (January 3, 1777) surprised Howe, who now decided that the Continental Army must be destroyed for peace to be secured. Although the ministry in London failed to provide the resources that Howe requested, he abandoned some posts and put together a

Howe, William, 5th Viscount | 135

substantial force to move against the American capital city of Philadelphia, which Howe believed Washington would be forced to defend. At the same time that the secretary of state for the colonies, Lord George Germain, was approving Howe’s plan, he approved another submitted by General Burgoyne for an advance from Canada against upstate New York and allowed Howe to ignore Burgoyne, who assumed that he would have Howe’s cooperation with a thrust up the Hudson. Howe simply informed Burgoyne that he would leave a corps in New York under Clinton that might act in support of Burgoyne should circumstances allow. Germain assumed, incorrectly, that Howe would move more quickly than was the case and then be able to support Burgoyne, but he did not order him to do so. The result was most unfortunate for the British cause. Howe departed New York by sea with 15,000 men on July 23 and then moved into Chesapeake Bay. He landed his men on August 25 and proceeded against Philadelphia. Washington was ready. The two sides met in the Battle of Brandywine (September 11). Howe planned a holding attack and a flanking maneuver that might well have destroyed Washington’s army. However, he again held back, and Washington was able to escape northward. Howe took Philadelphia on September 26. Although Clinton did move up the Hudson from New York, it was too little too late, and Burgoyne met defeat in the decisive battles at Saratoga (September 19 and October 7), surrendering on October 17. Meanwhile, on October 4, Howe held off an attack by Washington in the Battle of Germantown. Howe held Philadelphia, but it was devoid of significance; he had failed in his effort to destroy Washington’s army. In a series of letters, Germain criticized Howe’s failure to

136 | Howe, William, 5th Viscount

adequately support Burgoyne, and some of Howe’s own officers questioned his conduct of operations. In October, Howe offered his resignation, blaming Germain for inadequate support. On April 4, 1778, Howe learned that his resignation had been accepted, and on May 8, Clinton arrived to take command. Following a lavish farewell party in Philadelphia on May 18, Howe sailed a week later for home, arriving in Portsmouth on July 1. On his return, he sought, without great success, to make the case with his brother Richard that they had not received sufficient support to achieve victory. In 1782, William Howe was made lieutenant general of the ordnance, and in 1790, he assumed command of forces organized for war against Spain. In 1793, he was promoted to full general. He held various home commands in the early part of the French Revolutionary Wars, in particular that of the Eastern District when the French secured control of the Dutch coast. In 1795, he became governor of Berwick-on-Tweed. In 1799, on the death of his brother Richard,

William Howe succeeded to the Irish viscountcy. In 1803, he resigned from the army for reasons of health. In 1805, he became governor of Plymouth, where he died on July 12, 1814. With his death, the Irish peerage became extinct. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Anderson, Troyer Steele. The Command of the Howe Brothers during the American Revolution. New York: Oxford University Press, 1936. Billias, George A., ed. George Washington’s Generals and Opponents: Their Exploits and Leadership. 1964. Reprint, New York: Da Capo, 1994. Curtis, Edward P. The Organization of the British Army in the American Revolution. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1926. Hibbert, Christopher. Redcoats and Rebels: The American Revolution through British Eyes. New York: Avon Books, 1990. Peckham, Howard H. The War for Independence: A Military History. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968.

I Infantry Tactics. See Linear Tactics

137

J Jefferson, Thomas(1743–1826)

Jefferson left Congress in September 1776 to serve in the new Virginia House of Delegates. He concentrated his energies for the next several years on trying to institutionalize his ideas of political and religious freedom in Virginia. He believed that a general social revolution as well as a war with Great Britain for independence needed to occur. His goal was to create a meritocracy, a society in which a natural aristocracy based on talent and merit rather than on wealth and birth would lead. Jefferson was elected governor of Virginia in 1779, and his tenure proved to be highly controversial. His financial stewardship left much to be desired, and eastern portions of Virginia were devastated by British invasions in December 1780 and again in March 1781. He was blamed for the lack of military preparedness, even though he had little authority to act. Jefferson barely escaped capture at Charlottesville in a daring raid by British lieutenant colonel Banastre Tarleton (June 3–4, 1781), and some members of the legislature were taken prisoner. After Jefferson’s term ended in 1781, a legislative inquiry cleared him of all charges of dereliction of duty, but he was so humiliated that he decided to retire from public life. He might have remained secluded at Monticello, but his wife’s death in September 1782 drove him to seek escape from his grief through work. Jefferson returned to the Continental Congress in 1783 and served until he was appointed a special commissioner to France in 1784 and then minister to France in 1785.

Thomas Jefferson was a planter, a politician, a writer, a diplomat, and the third president of the United States (1801–1809). He was born on April 13, 1743, into a prominent family at Shadwell plantation (Albemarle County, Virginia). He graduated from the College of William and Mary in 1762 and was admitted to the bar in 1767. Until the outbreak of the American Revolution, Jefferson lived the life of a wealthy Virginia aristocrat. He practiced law, married Martha Wayles Skelton in 1772, began the construction of his mansion at Monticello, and served variously as magistrate, county lieutenant, and member of the Virginia House of Burgesses (1769–1775). As a member of the Second Continental Congress (1775–1776), Jefferson, along with Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Roger Sherman, and Robert R. Livingston, was asked to draw up a declaration of independence. The completed document was composed from ideas suggested by the committee members and the Congress. Jefferson actually wrote most of the text, contributing the impassioned and stirring prose that continues to inspire Americans. The vision of a world in which all people are treated equally regardless of their birth, class, or status and in which governments exist to improve the quality of life of their citizens, not to control them, still serves as a model for oppressed people around the world. The Declaration of Independence was adopted on July 4, 1776.

139

140 | Jefferson, Thomas

Thomas Jefferson was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States and the principal author of the Declaration of Independence. He was also governor of Virginia during 1779–1781 and president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. A Renaissance man, Jefferson was also an accomplished architect, writer, inventor, and scientist. (Library of Congress)

He remained in Paris as Franklin’s successor until 1789. While in Paris, Jefferson’s Notes on the State of Virginia (1781) was published. A highly respected natural his­ tory, it established his reputation in Europe as a scientist. It was in Paris that Jefferson reviewed the newly written U.S. Constitution of 1787 and added his support to the demand for a Bill of Rights to ensure adequate protection of individual liberties. Before his return to the United States, Jefferson witnessed the early stages of the French Revolution, and he could not hide his enthusiasm for the principles heralded in the revolt or his support for its moderate factions.

Shortly after Jefferson’s return to the United States in 1789, President George Washington asked him to become secretary of state. Jefferson reluctantly agreed and served in that post until the end of Washington’s first term in 1793. It was during this period that a bitter rivalry emerged between Jefferson and Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, which led to the formation of two major political parties in the United States: the Democratic-Republicans and the Federalists. Jefferson’s fears of a strong central government, his desire to protect small farmers, and his wish to forge a close political bond with France were not shared by Hamilton. Hamilton, favoring a broad interpretation of the Constitution, sought a more activist, centralized government and hoped to increase trade with Great Britain. Washington attempted to follow a middle path, but Jefferson, who believed in a narrow interpretation of the Constitution, decided that the president had adopted Hamilton’s perspective after he supported the establishment of a national bank. Jefferson eventually became the leader of the Democratic-Republican Party. Jefferson decided to retire to Monticello in 1793. For the next three years, his supporters and other opponents of Hamilton and the Federalists worked to secure Jefferson’s election to the presidency. In 1796, although Jefferson did no campaigning, he received only three fewer electoral votes than Federalist John Adams and was therefore elected vice president. Relations between Jefferson and Adams were cordial at first (the two men had been close friends for years), but Adams’s decision to support most of Hamilton’s programs earned Jefferson’s enmity. The tumult caused by the Alien and Sedition Acts (1798), which Jefferson ardently opposed, as well as the

Jefferson, Thomas | 141



growing international crisis precipitated by the French Revolution and the domestic conflict arising from Hamilton’s national economic development program culminated in Jefferson’s election to the presidency in 1800. The latter emerged from an acrimonious campaign between himself and Adams and a constitutional tussle involving the vice presidential candidate Aaron Burr, who had received as many electoral votes as Jefferson. This threw the election into the House of Representatives to be sorted out, but in the end, Jefferson prevailed. During his first term as president, Jefferson reduced the national debt, cut taxes, and sought, unsuccessfully, to reduce the power of the Federalist-dominated judiciary. Although he believed in a strict constructionist interpretation of the Constitution in theory, in practice, Jefferson was more flexible. When a unique opportunity was provided by France’s emperor Napoleon to purchase the Louisiana Territory in 1803, Jefferson committed the United States to the sale, although the Constitution did not specifically authorize the government to acquire foreign territory. His only foreign military intervention was to order the small American navy to blockade Tripoli and suppress raids by Barbary pirates on American shipping. Although the military effects of these actions were mixed, the action was extremely popular, and the securing of a favorable treaty in 1805 with Tripoli seemed to justify his use of force. Jefferson was easily reelected in 1804. Jefferson’s second term was dominated by efforts to protect the country’s neutral trade rights as warring Britain and France both established naval blockades against each other. The British impressment of seamen was a constant grievance, and when the British warship Leopard fired on and boarded the U.S. Navy frigate Chesapeake

in 1807, the American public clamored for a declaration of war. Jefferson, who opposed a large navy, decided to rely on economic and diplomatic pressure instead. These efforts resulted in the economic disaster of a trade embargo and utterly failed to deter the British. The result was that by the time he left office in 1809, Jefferson was the target of considerable public hostility. The furor, however, was not sufficient to prevent the election of Jefferson’s chosen successor, James Madison. Jefferson now retired to Monticello. However, retirement did not mean inactivity. Before his death, Jefferson achieved one more major goal: the establishment of the University of Virginia. He was also active as the president of the American Philosophical Society (1797–1815). He mended his friendship with Adams and began a long correspondence with his old companion in which they discussed political theory and the state of the country. Jefferson died on the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1826, shortly after noon and just a few hours before Adams’s death. Steven G. O’Brien

Further Reading Cunningham, Noble, Jr. In Pursuit of Reason: The Life of Thomas Jefferson. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1987. Malone, Dumas. Jefferson and His Time. Vol. 1, Jefferson the Virginian. Boston: Little, Brown, 1948. Matthews, Richard K. The Radical Politics of Thomas Jefferson: A Revisionist View. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1984. Selby, John E. The Revolution in Virginia, 1775–1783. Williamsburg, VA: Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 1988.

142 | Jones, John Paul

Jones, John Paul(1747–1792) Continental Navy officer John Paul Jones, was born John Paul (later adding “Jones” to his name) on July 6, 1747. He was raised in humble circumstances at Arbigland, in the parish of Kirkbean, Kirkcudbright, Scotland. Jones went to sea in the merchant marine at age 12, sailing from Whitehaven, and was soon an accomplished seaman. While still under age 20, he served as first mate on two slave ships but left that trade in disgust. He was making his way home in a ship as a passenger when the deaths of two of the officers left him as the only navigator. He successfully brought the ship into its home port, and the ship’s Scottish owners then employed him as a master. Jones made two voyages for them to the West Indies. Jones was a strict disciplinarian; in 1770, an inquiry was opened against him on the island of Tobago following the death of one of his crewmen. Paul’s brother, a resident of Fredericksburg, Virginia, died in 1773, and Jones proceeded there that December to settle his brother’s affairs, subsequently assuming the name of John Paul Jones. When the American Revolutionary War began two years later, Jones made his way to Philadelphia, where on December 22, 1775, the Continental Congress appointed him a lieutenant in the newly formed Continental Navy. Jones accompanied Commodore Esek Hopkins as senior first lieutenant on the flagship Alfred in the New Providence Island Expedition (February 17–April 8, 1776). Given command of the sloop Providence (12 guns), Jones embarked on a six-week cruise in the North Atlantic, during which he took 16 prizes. He was promoted to captain on October 10, 1776, but let it be known that he was unhappy with Congress for having listed him as only 18th in seniority.

Assuming command of the larger and more powerful ship Alfred (24 guns), Jones took additional prizes off Nova Scotia. In March 1777, Jones was appointed commander of the sloop Ranger (18 guns), the first ship to fly the Stars and Stripes (July 4, 1777), and on November 1, he sailed in it for France. Jones sought to take advantage of the recent treaty of the Franco-American alliance (February 6, 1778) to secure command of a warship under construction and with it raid British territorial waters. He arrived at Nantes only to learn that the ship in question had been sold. While cruising Quiberon Bay, his ship received the first official salute to the American flag in European waters from French warships (February 14, 1778). On April 10, 1778, Jones sailed from Brest and took the Ranger into the Irish Sea. After taking British prizes in St. George’s Channel, he brazenly sent men ashore at the port town of Whitehaven, where he had lived as a boy. He held the town for several hours (April 23, 1778) and attempted to burn shipping there. That same day, the Ranger crossed to St. Mary’s Island, where Jones hoped to capture the Earl of Selkirk to secure better treatment for American prisoners of war, but the earl was away. On April 24, Jones sailed to Carrickfergus, Ireland, and there engaged and defeated the Royal Navy sloop Drake (20 guns), the first Royal Navy warship taken during the war in British home waters. After effecting temporary repairs and with a prize crew manning the Drake, Jones sailed around the west coast of Ireland, taking another prize and returning to Brest on May 8. Jones then spent several weeks refitting in France. Meanwhile, the American representative in Paris, Benjamin Franklin, arranged for Jones to captain the former French East Indiaman Duc de Duras. Jones

Jones, John Paul | 143



subsequently renamed the frigate of 42 guns the Bonhomme Richard in honor of his patron. Jones then sailed in company with the Continental frigate Alliance (36 guns) to escort a French merchant ship convoy to Bordeaux. On the night of June 19, 1779, the Alliance, captained by Pierre Landais, collided with the Bonhomme Richard. Both ships sustained damage but were able to continue the mission. Jones blamed Landais for the incident. On August 14, 1779, Jones departed France in concert with the Alliance and several smaller French vessels and circumnavigated the British Isles, taking 17 prizes. Spotting a British convoy, Jones undertook a desperate night engagement with the escorting 50-gun Royal Navy frigate Serapis off Flamborough Head (September 23, 1779). Both ships, lashed together, pounded each other at point-blank range. Jones’s situation was made worse when the Alliance fired on both engaged ships. When the British captain called upon Jones to surrender, Jones responded, “No, I’ll sink, but I’ll be damned if I will strike.” This was later recalled as “I have not yet begun to fight.” Within the hour, the Serapis struck. In this sanguinary action, each ship had lost half its crew, killed or wounded. Despite efforts to save it, the Bonhomme Richard sank after the victory. Jones subsequently took command of the Alliance, which with the rest of his squadron sailed to the Texel Roads in the Netherlands. On December 27, 1779, Jones evaded British blockaders and sailed the Alliance to Ushant. He then decided to sail for Spain but had little success in the Bay of Biscay. After repairs undertaken at Corunna, in February 1780, the Alliance was at Lorient. There, Franklin informed Jones that he was to sail with a cargo of arms and uniform cloth for the United States. Hoping for a

more significant ship and not wishing to depart, Jones dallied in Paris, allowing Landais to regain control of the Alliance and set sail for the United States. (Arriving on the scene, Jones personally intervened with French authorities to let the Alliance depart.) Jones spent the remainder of the war constructing warships and negotiating prize money in France. He also received a Congressional Gold Medal, the only naval officer so honored during the war. Jones hoped to become the first American admiral and was assigned command of what was to be the first American ship with 74 guns, the America, but Congress awarded that ship to France as a gift in September 1782 to replace a French ship of the line that had been lost. Finding no employment in the United States at the end of the war, Jones accepted appointment from Russian empress Catherine II (Catherine the Great) as an admiral of the Black Sea Fleet in 1788. He commanded a squadron that year against the Ottoman Turks, but internecine court politics led to his being placed on a two-year suspension from duty and induced him to leave Russia in late summer 1789. Jones wound up in Paris and died there on July 18, 1792. His remains, which were located in an unmarked grave in 1905, were returned to the United States and reinterred in the U.S. Naval Academy Chapel in Annapolis, Maryland, in 1913. An excellent seaman who was both brave and resolute and who insisted on high professional standards and rigorous training, John Paul Jones was the United States’ first great naval hero. John C. Fredriksen and Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Boudriot, Jean. John Paul Jones and the Bonhomme Richard: A Reconstruction of the

144 | Jones, John Paul Ship and an Account of the Battle with H.M.S. Serapis. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1987. Callo, Joseph. John Paul Jones: America’s First Sea Warrior. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2006.

Morison, Samuel E. John Paul Jones: A Sailor’s Biography. Boston: Little, Brown, 1959. Thomas, Evan. John Paul Jones: Sailor, Hero, Father of the American Navy. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2003.

K Kings Mountain, Battle of (October 7, 1780)

the Watauga settlements beyond the Appalachian Mountains to the west, in what is now Tennessee, that if they did not end their opposition to the Crown, he would cross the mountains, hang their leaders, and lay waste to their settlements. The frontiersmen of the Watauga settlements decided that if there was to be fighting, it should not be on their own territory. Colonel Isaac Shelby and John Sevier issued a call for men. They called on Colonel William Campbell of Virginia, and he in turn summoned Colonel Benjamin Cleveland of North Carolina. By September 25, an allmilitia force of some 900 men had assembled at Sycamore Flats on the Watauga River. Most of the men were mounted, but armed with the long rifle, they would fight on foot. Ferguson was moving northward to support Cornwallis’s invasion of North Carolina south toward the British outpost of Ninety Six when he learned that the “backwoodsmen,” as Ferguson called them, were converging against him. The Patriot militia force had now grown to 1,400 men, but its leaders decided that 900 of the best mounted men should press ahead in pursuit of Ferguson, with the remainder to follow as soon as they could. Ferguson took up a position at Kings Mountain in rural York County, just across the border in South Carolina and some 30 miles west of Charlotte, with about 1,100 men, including several hundred new recruits from North Carolina. A seemingly strong position, Kings Mountain rose some 60 feet above the surrounding countryside

At the end of 1778, Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton, the British commander in North America, had shifted the principal theater of the American Revolutionary War to the South, where it was believed there was strong Tory (Loyalist) sentiment. The campaign opened to great success, with the British capturing both Savannah, Georgia, and Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina (the greatest Patriot defeat of the war). The British envisioned conquering a given area and then turning it over to a local Tory militia to hold, but the war in the South soon degenerated into a savage contest of Tory versus Patriot, with both sides committing widespread atrocities. After the capture of Charles Town, Clinton returned to New York, leaving able lieutenant general Lord Charles Cornwallis in charge in the South. In June, Cornwallis had detached about 100 provincials designated the American Volunteers under Major Patrick Ferguson of the 71st Regiment of Foot. Clinton had appointed Ferguson the inspector of militia, with the responsibility for organizing and training South Carolina’s Loyalist militia units. Ferguson was a capable, young (age 36) officer who had designed a remarkable breech-loading rifle that could be fired five to six times a minute. An implacable foe of the rebels, he led the American Volunteers and militia against American partisans operating in the South Carolina backcountry. He also issued a challenge to the inhabitants of 145

146 | Knox, Henry

and was some 500 yards long and 70 to 80 yards wide. Ferguson, expecting British reinforcements that never arrived, had detached some 200 men on a foraging expedition the morning of October 7 when the Patriot militia arrived and surrounded his position. This was a battle of American against American, Ferguson being the only British officer present. The Patriots formed into groups and, taking advantage of cover and concealment on Kings Mountain’s wooded slopes, began working their way upward. The defenders, although well trained, were shooting downhill and tended to fire high. The Patriots were, for the most part, excellent marksmen. The battle lasted little more than an hour. None of the 1,000 Tories who took part escaped. A total of 157 were killed, 163 were wounded so badly that they were left on the field, and 698 were taken prisoner. Ferguson was among the dead. He had refused calls to surrender and had been killed in a volley of shots while he and some of his men were trying to break free. Patriot losses were only 28 killed and 62 wounded. The Battle of Kings Mountain was one of the most important of the entire war. It was an immense boost to Patriot morale and temporarily halted efforts by Cornwallis to secure North Carolina. Upon learning of events, on October 14, he withdrew to Winnsboro, South Carolina, for the winter. The battle did have several negatives for the Continental Army in the South in that it seemed to end the immediate need to strengthen Patriot forces there and reinforced the mistaken belief held by some that militia alone could produce victory. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Allen, Thomas B. Tories: Fighting for the King in America’s First Civil War. New York: HarperCollins, 2010. Buchanan, John. The Road to Guilford Court House: The American Revolution in the Carolinas. New York: Wiley, 1997. Dameron, J. David. Kings Mountain: The Defeat of the Loyalists, October 7, 1780. Cambridge, MA: Da Capo, 2003. Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. 2 vols. New York: Macmillan, 1952.

Knox, Henry(1750–1806) Henry Knox was an American general and U.S. secretary of war. He was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on July 25, 1750, and attended Boston Latin School until forced by the death of his father to go to work at age 12 in a bookstore. He went on to establish his own bookstore in Boston in 1771. Largely self-educated, Knox read widely, especially in the practice of artillery, and joined a local artillery company in 1768. In 1772, he cofounded the Boston Grenadier Corps, another militia group, and served as its second-in-command. Knox was a witness to the Boston Massacre (March 5, 1770) and testified at the subsequent trial of the British soldiers involved. He was a supporter of the Sons of Liberty. In 1774, Knox married Lucy Flucker, the daughter of Loyalists, whose brother served in the British Army. With the beginning of the American Revolutionary War, Knox and his family left Boston. He then fought in the Battle of Bunker Hill (June 17, 1775). During the prolonged siege of Boston during April 19, 1775–March 17, 1776, Knox became close to Continental Army



commander general George Washington. Commissioned a colonel in the Continental Army, Knox took command of its artillery regiment. Generally credited with originating this idea, during December 5, 1775–January 25, 1776, he supervised the removal and transport by oxen and sledge through the snow of 55 cannon from Fort Ticonderoga, some 300 miles to the Boston area, in what has been called one of the most spectacular logistical feats of the war. The subsequent emplacement of these guns on the heights around the city forced the British evacuation of Boston, ending the first phase of the American Revolutionary War. Thereafter, Knox remained one of Washington’s closest military associates. Knox fought in the Battle of Long Island (August 27, 1776) and other New York battles and then helped supervise removal of much of the Continental Army artillery in the retreat across New Jersey. He participated in organizing and then fought in the pivotal battles of Trenton (December 26, 1776) and Princeton (January 3, 1777), gaining promotion to brigadier general on December 17, 1776. Knox helped establish both the Springfield Arsenal, the new nation’s first arsenal, and the Academy Artillery School (the precursor to the U.S. Military Academy). He fought in the Battle of Brandywine (September 11, 1777) and at Germantown (October 4, 1777). He was with the army at Valley Forge during the winter of 1777–1778, when he greatly improved the training and efficiency of the Continental Army artillery. He then took part in the Battle of Monmouth Court House (June 28, 1778). Knox was a member of the court that convicted British major John André in the treason of Major General Benedict Arnold.

Knox, Henry | 147

He also played a major role in the Siege of Yorktown (September 28–October 19, 1781). On Washington’s strong recommendation, in March 1783, Knox was promoted to major general, the youngest in the army, with his promotion backdated to November 15, 1781. After commanding at West Point, Knox took over from Washington as commander in chief of the army in December 1783 until he retired in June 1784. Knox cofounded the Society of the Cincinnati, an organization of former Continental Army officers, in May 1783. Congress appointed Knox secretary of war in 1785, in which post he helped quell Shays’ Rebellion in 1786. When the nation adopted the U.S. Constitution and Washington became president of the United States in 1789, he asked Knox to remain as secretary of war. Knox pressed for a stronger federal military and proposed a system of universal military training. Congress ultimately passed the Militia Act of 1792, a greatly diluted version of Knox’s original plan. Two disastrous campaigns against the Northwestern Native Americans followed in 1790 and 1791, but Knox oversaw the creation of the Legion of the United States under Major General Anthony Wayne with its victory over the Native Americans in the Battle of Fallen Timbers (August 20, 1794). Knox also presided over the creation of the U.S. Navy when Congress authorized construction of six frigates in 1794. Knox resigned his office in December 1794 and retired to his estate at Thomaston, Massachusetts (now Maine). Briefly reappointed a major general during the Quasi-War with France (1798–1800), Knox died suddenly at his estate on October 25, 1806. Spencer C. Tucker

148 | Knyphausen, Wilhelm, Freiherr von Innhausen und

Further Reading Callahan, North. Henry Knox: George Washington’s General. South Brunswick, NY: A. S. Barnes, 1958. Kohn, Richard. Eagle and Sword: The Federalists and the Creation of the Military Establishment in America, 1783–1802. New York: Free Press, 1975. Palmer, Dave R. 1794: America, Its Army, and the Birth of the Nation. Novato, CA: Presidio, 1994. Puls, Mark. Henry Knox: Visionary General of the American Revolution. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008.

Knyphausen, Wilhelm, Freiherr von Innhausen und(1716–1800) Wilhelm Freiherr von Innhausen und Knyphausen was a German general from Hesse-Cassel (Hesse-Kassel). Born in Lütetsburg in Ostfriesland (East Friesland), on November 4, 1716, the son of an army colonel, Wilhelm von Knyphausen was educated at the Berlin Gymnasium, and he entered the Prussian Army in 1734. He fought in the War of the Austrian Succession (1740–1748) and was a major of grenadiers during the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), being promoted to lieutenant colonel in 1760. By 1775, he was a lieutenant general in the service of Landgrave Friedrich II of Hesse-Kassel. Respected by his men and regarded as a well-schooled military professional and strict disciplinarian, Knyphausen commanded the second division of the HesseCassel forces that departed for England, sailing with some 4,100 men on May 9, 1776. He and his men then left England on July 20 and reached New York on October 18. They came ashore at New Rochelle on October 23, joining the other Hesse-Cassel

forces that had arrived earlier under Lieutenant General Leopold von Heister, who had overall command of the Hesse-Cassel forces in North America. Knyphausen was second-in-command. After reconstructing King’s, Dyckman’s, and Williams’s Bridges over the Hudson River, all of which had been destroyed by Patriot forces, Knyphausen’s corps carried out the main assault on Fort Washington on the east bank of the Hudson on November 16, resulting in the capture of that Continental Army bastion. Knyphausen took the fort’s surrender from Colonel Robert Magaw. The key role played by Knyphausen’s troops was recognized in its renaming as Fort Knyphausen. Knyphausen then took command of four Hessian and three British regiments, controlling the upper end of Manhattan from Fort Knyphausen to King’s Bridge. The seeming reticence of Heister to commit his men to battle, differences between Prussian and British drill, plundering by Hessian troops, and the defeat of the Hessian garrison at Trenton (December 26, 1776) all led the British government to request that Landgrave Friedrich recall Heister, which he did in June 1777. Upon Heister’s departure on July 19, Knyphausen assumed command of the Hessian forces in America. Unlike his predecessor, Knyphausen forged an effective relationship with the British Army commanders in North America that would stand him in good stead until his return to Germany in 1782. He worked at improving relations with British Army commander in North America General Sir William Howe, at training his men (many of whom had arrived poorly prepared), at improving discipline, and at reducing plundering. Accomplishing all of these, Knyphausen won British confidence.



Knyphausen, Wilhelm, Freiherr von Innhausen und | 149

Knyphausen sailed from New York with Howe’s expeditionary force on July 20, 1777, in what would be the Philadelphia campaign. Howe gave him command of the second division of the army, with Major General Lord Charles Cornwallis commanding the first division. Knyphausen’s men fought well in the Battle of Brandywine (September 11, 1777), carrying out the attack at Chadds Ford that was designed to hold Continental Army commander general George Washington’s men in place while Cornwallis and Howe conducted a flanking attack in an unsuccessful effort to trap Washington’s army. Knyphausen commanded the forces that took Boot’s Tavern in the so-called Battle of White Horse Tavern (September 16, 1777). Following Howe’s seizure of Philadelphia, Knyphausen played an important role in the Battle of Germantown (October 4, 1777). He then commanded one of the two British columns during the Battle of Whitemarsh (December 5–8). Knyphausen gained considerable respect during the occupation of Philadelphia when he paid rent for his residence, which belonged to Pennsylvania brigadier general John Cadwalader. Knyphausen also had a household inventory taken, and on his departure, this was checked to see that nothing had been removed, including Cadwalader’s wines. Knyphausen participated in Howe’s effort to trap Continental Army forces under Major General Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, at Barren Hill on May 10, 1778. Enjoying the full confidence of new British commander lieutenant general Sir Henry Clinton, Knyphausen commanded the first division in the evacuation of Philadelphia, preserving the British baggage train intact during the Battle of Monmouth (June 28) until the evacuation at Sandy Hook on July 5, 1778.

Clinton gave Knyphausen command of Manhattan, and in September 1778, Knyphausen led 3,000 men on a foraging expedition up the east bank of the Hudson. Clinton included Knyphausen in his war councils, although there is no evidence that the Hessian general had any influence on British military strategy. On his departure for Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, in December 1779, Clinton left Knyphausen in command of the remaining British forces at New York. In Clinton’s absence, Knyphausen, relying on exaggerated reports of Loyalist strength, initiated a campaign in New Jersey. Assembling 6,000 men, he crossed to Elizabethtown and then moved inland to Connecticut Farms in June before withdrawing back to New York. On his return to New York following the surrender of Charles Town (May 12, 1780), Clinton again ordered Knyphausen to campaign in New Jersey. In June Knyphausen’s forces reached Springfield, but strong American resistance forced his withdrawal. The New Jersey operation was Knyphausen’s last of the war. In poor health, he remained in New York, his requests to Friedrich II that he be relieved denied. Clinton used Knyphausen’s declining health as a reason for not going to the relief of Cornwallis in the Siege of Yorktown (September 28– October 19, 1781). In May 1782, Knyphausen’s infirmities could no longer be ignored, as he had lost the use of one eye to a cataract. Succeeded by Major General Baron Friedrich Wilhelm von Lossberg, Knyphausen sailed to England in the same ship as Clinton, who was succeeded by Lieutenant General Sir Guy Carleton. On Knyphausen’s return to Hesse-Cassel, Friedrich II named him military governor of Kassel. Knyphausen died at Kassel on December 7, 1800. Spencer C. Tucker

150 | Knyphausen, Wilhelm, Freiherr von Innhausen und

Further Reading Atwood, Rodney. The Hessians. 1980. Reprint, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Crytzer, Brady J. Hessians: Mercenaries, Rebels, and the War for British North America. Yardley, PA: Westholme, 2015.

Ewald, Johann. Diary of the American War: A Hessian Journal. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1979. Lowell, Edward J. The Hessians and the Other German Auxiliaries of Great Britain in the Revolutionary War. 1884. Reprint, Williamstown, MA: Corner House, 1975.

L Lafayette, Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de(1757–1834)

Continental Congress commissioned him a major general. He met General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, who placed the inexperienced young officer on his own staff. The two men became very close—Washington in effect becoming his adopted father. Yet, Lafayette did not hesitate to speak his mind when he believed it was required. Lafayette distinguished himself and was wounded in the leg in his first combat, the Battle of Brandywine (September 11, 1777). He spent the winter of 1777–1778 at Valley Forge. A plan for an invasion of Canada to be led by him in early 1778 had to be canceled for want of resources. Lafayette fought well in the battles at Barren Hill (May 20, 1778) and Monmouth (June 28). Lafayette then served as liaison between American and French forces attempting to take Newport, Rhode Island, in July–August. In October 1778, Congress granted Lafayette leave to return to France. He arrived there in February 1779 and received a hero’s welcome. He was received at Versailles, but as punishment for having joined the American army without official permission, King Louis XVI ordered Lafayette to serve eight days of house arrest. While in France, Lafayette helped arrange for the French expeditionary force to America under Lieutenant General Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau. Returning to the United States in April 1780, Lafayette served as liaison between Washington and Rochambeau. In February 1781, Lafayette took command of the Virginia Light Corps and with it disrupted

French nobleman, Continental Army general, French Army general, and French political leader, Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, was born at Chavaniac, Auvergne, France, on September 6, 1757, a member of one of the greatest noble families of France. His father was killed in the Battle of Minden on August 1, 1759, during the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), and on the death of both his mother and grandfather in 1770, young Lafayette inherited an immense fortune. Lafayette joined a French infantry regiment in April 1771 but transferred to the dragoons two years later. He married a wealthy heiress, Anastasie Adrienne de Noailles, in April 1774 and shortly thereafter was promoted to captain and transferred to Metz. In the summer of 1776, he learned of the American Declaration of Independence. Inspired by the ideas it expressed and seeking military experience, Lafayette secured an introduction to Silas Deane, the American representative in Paris, and a commission as a major general in the Continental Army. Despite the protests of his family and the French court, Lafayette crossed into Spain in April 1777 and from there sailed to America in a ship, La Victoire, that he had purchased and outfitted at his own expense. Arriving in Philadelphia that July, he offered his services without pay, and the 151

152 | Lee, Charles

British brigadier general Benedict Arnold’s raids and also harried the numerically superior British forces there. Lafayette played an important role in the Yorktown campaign (August–October 1781) as commander of one of the American divisions. Returning to France in December 1781, Lafayette received an appointment as major general in the French Army. After a brief trip to the United States in July–December 1784, where he found himself lionized, he played a leading role in the early period of the French Revolution. As a member of the Assembly of Notables in 1787, he also represented Auvergne in the States General in 1789. After being appointed commander of the National Guard that July, in October, he helped save the royal family from the Parisian mob that had traveled to Versailles. Promoted to lieutenant general in 1791, Lafayette took command of the French Army of the Center in the spring of 1792. Under suspicion from the radical Jacobins who in August had overthrown the constitutional monarchy he had helped to create, Lafayette fled France, only to be imprisoned by the Austrians. Released in 1797, he returned to France, living on his wife’s estate at La Grange-Bléneau. He supported Napoleon Bonaparte’s liberal constitution of 1815 in the Hundred Days and then helped secure his second abdication. Following the return of King Louis XVIII to France, Lafayette entered the Chamber of Deputies in 1818. He made a farewell tour of the United States in 1824 and played an important role in the July Revolution of 1830 in France against King Charles X, when he again commanded the National Guard, and also rallied support for Louis Philippe, duc d’Orléans, to be king. Later Lafayette denounced Louis Philippe for failing to fulfill his promises. Lafayette died in Paris on May 20, 1834.

Intelligent and an effective military commander who was genuinely concerned for his men, Lafayette remained a lifelong advocate of the principles of liberty and self-government espoused by the American Revolution, which he sought in vain to bring to his own country. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Gottschalk, Louis. Lafayette in America. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1975. Kramer, Lloyd S. Lafayette in Two Worlds: Public Cultures and Personal Identities in an Age of Revolutions. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1999. Taillemite, Étienne. La Fayette. Paris: Fayard, 1989.

Lee, Charles(1732–1782) Charles Lee, a former British Army officer and Continental Army major general during the American War of Independence, was born in Cheshire, England, on February 5, 1732. He was commissioned an ensign in the 55th Regiment on April 9, 1746. Proud, scholarly, intelligent, fearless, ambitious, moody, turbulent (perhaps psychologically imbalanced), and vain, he quickly advanced through the ranks of the British Army. During the French and Indian War (1754–1763), he saw action in North America, married a Seneca chieftain’s daughter, and was promoted to major. He returned to England in 1761. For the next decade or so, Lee lived a life of discontent and discouragement, in part because his sharp tongue hindered his advancement in the military ranks. For a time, he served in the Portuguese Army, and in 1769, he campaigned with the Poles as a major general against the Ottoman



Turks. Back in Britain by 1772, he was at last promoted to lieutenant colonel but was by then so embittered against King George III and the British establishment that he was espousing republican principles. In 1773, Lee left Britain for America. Joining in the agitation against the Tea Act, he traveled through America railing against British tyranny. He also became an advocate of irregular warfare and convinced many Americans that militia forces could defeat British regulars. He wrote a simplified drill manual and began training Marylanders for battle. In 1775, he purchased an estate in Berkeley County, Virginia, near the home of his friend Horatio Gates. On June 17, 1775, Congress appointed Lee a major general in the Continental Army, second in rank to the commander in chief, General George Washington. Five days later, Lee resigned his British commission. In July, he accompanied Washington to Boston and took charge of the besieging Continental Army’s left wing. Until December 1775, Lee served brilliantly at Boston, supervising the construction of entrenchments, training soldiers, and urging politicians to declare independence. He commanded at Newport, Rhode Island, from December 1775 until March 1776 and then for a short time at New York. He took command of the Southern Department on March 1, 1776. After arranging the defenses of Virginia and North Carolina, he moved in early June to Charles Town (present-day Charleston), South Carolina, where he helped repulse a British attack on Fort Moultrie on June 28, 1776. He rejoined Washington in New York in August, taking charge of the army’s right wing during its retreat from Manhattan and in the Battle of White Plains on October 28. After this battle, Lee urged Washington to withdraw all his forces to New Jersey, but Washington

Lee, Charles | 153

demurred, instead taking his army across the Hudson while leaving a garrison in Fort Washington on Manhattan Island. When the British captured the fort and its garrison on November 16, Lee’s faith in Washington plummeted. Lee now began to equivocate about obeying Washington’s orders. On November 10, Lee had been given command of troops at White Plains while Washington marched into New Jersey. In November and December 1776, Washington repeatedly sent Lee letters that ordered him to join the main army in its retreat. Lee failed to obey these instructions, and by December 12, he had only marched as far as Basking Ridge, New Jersey. Establishing his headquarters in a tavern, he wrote to Major General Horatio Gates on December 12 criticizing Washington’s military leadership. The following day, Lee was captured by a British patrol. Spending the next 16 months in captivity in New York, he worried that he might be executed as a British deserter and railed at Congress and Washington for not doing enough to free him. During his months of British incarceration, Lee decided that the Patriot war effort was doomed to failure and that the American people did not deserve independence. Therefore, he cooperated with the British in early 1777 in an attempt to bring about reconciliation within the empire. He also advised British generals on how to defeat Washington in the campaign of 1778. Lee was exchanged in April 1778 and unenthusiastically rejoined a Continental Army that had outgrown him. Informing Congress that the Americans were no match for the British, in June, he also urged Washington to avoid battle with the redcoats as they retreated from Philadelphia toward New York. Washington agreed with him but was determined to conduct a limited

154 | Lexington and Concord, Battles of

operation against the British rear guard with a detachment of 6,000 troops. He offered Lee command of this force and was at first turned down, but Lee then changed his mind. Washington, knowing Lee’s state of mind, reluctantly agreed. On June 28, 1778, Lee attacked at Monmouth, but in such fashion that his troops were thrown back in confusion. When Washington arrived on the field of battle, he furiously accused Lee of disobeying orders and took command himself. Washington soon restored some order and stopped the American rout. After the battle, Lee insisted that he had been conducting a fighting retreat and angrily demanded that Washington apologize. The latter refused, and Lee demanded a court-martial. Washington gladly complied, accusing Lee of disobedience and disrespect to a commanding officer and of conducting an unnecessary and disorderly retreat. On August 12, a court found Lee guilty of all charges and suspended him from the army for a year. Congress approved the decision on December 5. In response, Lee launched angry diatribes against Washington, Congress, and the American people. In 1779, during his worst difficulties, he fought a duel with Colonel John Laurens and was wounded in the arm. Brigadier General Anthony Wayne, who thought that Lee had impugned his character, also challenged him to a duel, but Lee publicly apologized. On January 10, 1780, Congress dismissed Lee from the army. During a visit to Philadelphia in 1782, Lee fell ill and died on October 2. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Moore, George H. Mr. Lee’s Plan, March 29, 1777: The Treason of Charles Lee, Major General, Second in Command in the

American Army of the Revolution. Port Washington, NY: Kennikat, 1970. Shy, John. “Charles Lee: The Soldier as Radical.” In George Washington’s Generals and Opponents: Their Exploits and Leadership, edited by George Athan Billias, 22–53. New York: Da Capo, 1994.

Lexington and Concord, Battles of(April 19, 1775) The Battles of Lexington and Concord were the opening military engagements of the American War of Independence. By early April 1775, tensions were running high between Britain and the American colonists. Differences of opinion about American rights within the British Empire, which had been building for a decade, reached a breaking point in December 1773. At that time, citizens of Boston had destroyed British tea in Boston Harbor, and Parliament responded with the Coercive Acts, which were designed to compel the people of Massachusetts to bow to the will of the British government. Among other things, these acts closed the Port of Boston, curtailed popular government, and placed Lieutenant General Thomas Gage, the British commander in chief in North America, in the governorship of the colony. By early 1775, the people of Massachusetts had organized the extralegal Massachusetts Provincial Congress, which met in Concord, and taken control of the colony’s militia. On April 14, 1775, Gage received orders from London to take decisive action against the rebels. If possible, he was to arrest John Hancock and Samuel Adams, the leaders of the Provincial Congress. This measure was precluded by the adjournment of Congress the following day, but Gage had another option. Having learned that the rebels were



collecting war supplies, especially cannon, in Concord, he deemed these a worthy target for military action. On April 15, he alerted the light infantry and grenadier companies of all eight British regiments under his command, about 700 men, to be ready for service. Gage placed these elite flank companies under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Francis Smith, with Major John Pitcairn of the Royal Marines as his second-incommand. Gage also appointed Brigadier General Hugh, Earl Percy, to command a relief force to be held in reserve in Boston and began securing boats from naval vessels in Boston Harbor for a ferrying operation across the Charles River to Cambridge. Dr. Joseph Warren, a prominent rebel leader in Boston, correctly deduced that Gage was preparing a military expedition into the countryside, probably by water rather than across Boston Neck. On April 16, Warren dispatched Paul Revere as a courier to Lexington to alert the countryside

Lexington and Concord, Battles of | 155

and warn Hancock and Adams, who were in Lexington, that a British force would soon be coming their way. When Revere returned to Boston that night, he arranged with observers to signal with lanterns from the steeple of Old North Church the direction that British troops were taking out of the city. On the evening of April 18, Gage began ferrying his soldiers across the Charles River, and at 2:00 a.m. on April 19, they began to march toward Lexington. Warren immediately took measures to rouse the countryside west of Boston. Robert Newman, sexton of the Old North Church, hung two lanterns in the steeple to warn the citizenry that the British were coming by water. Warren also dispatched Revere and William Dawes on horseback to spread the alarm. Seeing that the citizenry was alerted and that all surprise was lost, Smith sent word back to Gage that he should dispatch Percy with reinforcements.

Illustration of the engagement that took place at Lexington, Massachusetts, on April 19, 1775, fought between colonial militiamen and British troops sent from Boston to seize stocks of arms. Militia commander Captain John Parker and 7 other militiamen were killed, and 10 others were wounded. Both sides claimed the other had fired first. It did not matter, for the Revolutionary War had now begun. (Library of Congress)

156 | Lexington and Concord, Battles of

As Smith’s redcoats approached Lexington, the local minuteman company of 130 men, under Captain John Parker, mustered in two lines on the town green to oppose them. At sunrise, the British advance guard, commanded by Major Pitcairn, deployed to face Parker’s men. Pitcairn ordered the rebels to disperse, and some of them began to file away from the green. Suddenly, a shot rang out and then two or three others, and a British officer (not Pitcairn) ordered the British troops to fire and then charge the Americans with bayonets. Pitcairn attempted to hold back his troops, but they were ardent to kill Patriots. Parker and 7 of his men were killed, and 10 others were wounded. Later, both sides claimed that the other had fired the first shot. It did not matter. The American Revolutionary War had begun. Smith soon arrived on the scene, restored order, and, despite misgivings about his prospects, continued his march toward Concord, some seven miles distant. The rebels, about 200 strong and commanded by Colonel James Barrett, prepared to meet him at Barrett Farm, two miles beyond the Concord River. Smith sent three companies under Captain Walter Laurie toward the North Bridge to cross the river and proceed to Barrett Farm. Meanwhile, his remaining soldiers searched Concord, destroying whatever supplies they could find. Much of the military stores had already been removed to Barrett Farm. Rebel militia units continued to gather, concentrating above the North Bridge to protect these stores. In about an hour’s time, some 400 militiamen had mustered; they could see smoke rising from the buildings being burned in Concord. Barrett ordered the militiamen to move toward the bridge but not to fire first at the British posted there. Captain Laurie’s British soldiers, having crossed the North Bridge, watched

apprehensively as the rebel numbers swelled and then marched toward them. Laurie called for reinforcements from Smith and ordered his troops to fire a volley at the Americans. Barrett ordered the fire returned. The regulars then fell back across the bridge in disorder, meeting Smith’s reinforcements along the way. They all withdrew toward Concord. In the three-minute exchange of musket fire, the militiamen’s losses were two men killed and three wounded; the British had three killed and eight wounded. A young rebel killed a wounded British soldier with a hatchet, leading the British to later accuse the Americans of fighting like barbarians. At that point, the Americans dispersed, and the British finally reached Barrett Farm; however, the rebel supplies had again been moved. At noon, Smith ordered his troops to commence their return march to Boston, with the grenadiers on the road and the light infantry operating as flankers in the fields. Having gone without sleep for two days, the soldiers were exhausted. For the first mile, all went well, but then the redcoats encountered a 16-mile gauntlet of harassment by militiamen concealed behind walls, trees, and buildings. The Americans, lacking military training and discipline and mostly lightly armed, thought it blind foolishness to fight by European rules of engagement. The British, however, were infuriated by this kind of warfare, and when light infantry patrols drove the rebels back, the redcoats showed no mercy to any American within musket or bayonet range. Smith also allowed his soldiers to loot and pillage houses along the line of march. Soon, some of the soldiers were laden with spoils. They fought fierce battles at the “bloody angle,” east of Concord, and at Fiske Hill. As they neared Lexington, they were no longer a

Lincoln, Benjamin | 157



marching column but a disorderly mass of men in a state of near panic. At Lexington, they were fired upon by angry militiamen who were anxious to avenge their own losses of the morning. Smith’s command was teetering on the brink of a major military disaster. The desperate British troops were saved by a rescue column of 1,200 men under Percy, whom Gage had sent out from Boston toward Lexington. The relief force consisted of 450 marines; the 4th, 23rd, and 47th Regiments; and two 6-pounder cannon. Approaching Lexington at 2:30 p.m., Percy’s men could hear the sounds of battle. At the town, Percy quickly took command from Smith, dispersed the rebels, and allowed Smith’s troops to rest for an hour. Then he continued the retreat to Boston, with the soldiers continuing to loot and pillage, killing all male inhabitants they could find. Believing that a war of terror was the best way to deal with rebellious Americans, Percy made no attempt to halt these practices. At Menotomy (present-day Arlington), he faced some of the hardest fighting of the day. In this skirmish, Massachusetts Militia brigadier general William Heath attempted, without success, to deploy the militiamen in battle formations. As Percy approached Cambridge, the rebels continued to fight, trying to maneuver Percy into a trap by forcing him to take the Cambridge Road. Instead, he elected to take the route to Charlestown, which was five miles shorter and partially covered by British naval artillery. He was halted twice more at Somerville and Prospect Hill by Americans continuing their harassment. At last, just after sunset, Smith’s exhausted men staggered into Charlestown and came under the full protection of British warships. In 24 hours, they had marched 35 miles and had fought continuously for half

that distance without food or other sustenance. They were followed shortly afterward by Percy’s men. The operation was a sanguinary affair. The British losses were 73 killed, 182 wounded, and 22 captured. The Americans suffered 49 dead, 41 wounded, and 5 missing. The actions in the Lexington-Concord operation were sobering experiences for Gage, Percy, and the other British officers, and Gage was soon reporting worse news: 15,000 New England militiamen were besieging Boston. Many Americans, also shaken by the events of April 19, urged Gage to arrange an armistice so that matters could be amicably discussed. However, neither side would yield on basic points, so the war continued. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Alden, John Richard. “Why the March to Concord?” American Historical Review 49 (1944): 446–454. Fisher, David Hackett. Paul Revere’s Ride. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994. French, Allen. The Day of Concord and Lexington: The Nineteenth of April, 1775. Boston: Little, Brown, 1925. Gross, Robert A. The Minutemen and Their World. New York: Hill and Wang, 1976. Tourtellot, Arthur Bernon. Lexington and Concord: The Beginning of the War of the American Revolution. New York: Norton, 1963.

Lincoln, Benjamin(1733–1810) Continental Army officer Benjamin Lincoln was born in Hingham, Massachusetts, on January 24, 1733. In 1749, he began his military career by enrolling in his father’s

158 | Lincoln, Benjamin

militia regiment, the 3rd (later 2nd) Suffolk County Militia, as adjutant. He ultimately succeeded the elder Lincoln as colonel and commander and also became both a prosperous farmer and a member of the Massachusetts General Court. As imperial tensions mounted in the 1770s, Lincoln emerged as a champion of the Patriot cause. After the war began in April 1775, he marched with his regiment to the siege of Boston (April 19, 1775–March 17, 1776). Later, he was appointed muster master of the Massachusetts Militia, which put him in charge of organizing and training new recruits. In July, he was elected president of the Provincial Congress, and on January 30, 1776, he was appointed brigadier general of the Massachusetts Militia. After being promoted to major general of the Massachusetts Militia in September 1776, on October 16, Lincoln was ordered to march with seven Massachusetts regiments to New York to reinforce the Continental Army there. In the Battle of White Plains (October 28, 1776), he commanded the American right rear flank. Soon Lincoln and General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, were friends. In early January 1777, Lincoln served on the Hudson River above New York, taking part in an unsuccessful assault on Fort Independence (January 18–29). On February 19, Congress appointed him a major general in the Continental Army, and in July, Washington dispatched him to upstate New York (the Northern Department), where Major General Philip Schuyler confronted an invasion from Canada by a British army under Lieutenant General John Burgoyne. Lincoln took a post at Manchester in present-day Vermont, boosted public confidence, and persuaded Brigadier General John Stark to join him in defending against Burgoyne’s invasion. At Bennington, on August 16,

Stark’s militia inflicted a stinging defeat on one of Burgoyne’s Hessian units. Immediately thereafter, Lincoln began severing Burgoyne’s communications with Canada, and in late September 1777, he joined Major General Horatio Gates, who had replaced Schuyler, in defensive works near Saratoga. Given command of the American right wing, Lincoln occupied this position during the Battle of Bemis Heights on October 7. On reconnaissance the following morning, he fell in with retreating British troops and was severely wounded in his right ankle. For the next nine months, he was out of action and never fully recovered from his wound. Lincoln returned to duty in July 1778, joining Washington’s army at White Plains, New York. Lincoln presided over the courtmartial of Major General Arthur St. Clair on August 28, and in September, he was appointed by Congress to command the Southern Department. Reaching Charles Town (present-day Charleston) on December 4, Lincoln began planning an expedition against British forces in Florida. However, before he could act, a British expedition from New York under Lieutenant Colonel Archibald Campbell captured Savannah. Attempting to defend South Carolina and recover Georgia, Lincoln began a series of harassing attacks against British forces along the Savannah River and at Beaufort, South Carolina. Soon, however, Lincoln’s troops were driven back to Charles Town. On June 20, 1779, Lincoln launched a surprise counterattack against British major general Augustine Prévost at Stono Ferry and compelled him to withdraw from the state. After a summer of stalemates between the opposing forces, the British defeated a Franco-American assault on Savannah on October 9. Lincoln, who had participated in

Linear Tactics | 159



this fiasco, returned to Charles Town in disgust. In February 1780, Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton, the British commander in chief in North America, launched an army of 8,500 soldiers against Charles Town. Outnumbered three to one, Lincoln realized that he should retreat from the indefensible city but, against his better judgment, bowed to political pressure and allowed himself to be besieged. On May 12, after an obstinate and protracted defense, he surrendered, suffering the worst military defeat to befall the Continental Army during the war. He was paroled in June and returned home to Hingham, Massachusetts, where he remained until exchanged. In the spring of 1781, Lincoln rejoined Washington’s army at its encampment north of New York City. That autumn, Lincoln accompanied Washington to Yorktown, Virginia, as second-in-command of the Patriot army. During the Siege of Yorktown (September 28–October 19), Lincoln had charge of the American right wing. When British lieutenant general Lord Charles Cornwallis surrendered on October 19, Washington chose Lincoln to receive that officer’s sword as compensation for his own surrender at Charles Town. While at Yorktown, Lincoln was appointed by Congress to become secretary of war in the new national government organized under the Articles of Confederation. In that office, for the next two years, he employed his considerable talents as a military administrator to good purpose. He resigned as secretary of war on October 29, 1783. When Shays’ Rebellion began in western Massachusetts in 1786, Lincoln was recalled from retirement to command militia units that handily put down the rebellion in the late spring of 1787. During the remainder of

his life, he held a number of public and private offices and became interested in literary and scientific matters. Lincoln died in Hingham, Massachusetts, on May 9, 1810. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Bowden, A. J. Fifty-Five Letters of George Washington to Benjamin Lincoln, 1776– 1779. New York: n.p., 1907. Cavanagh, John Carroll. “American Military Leadership in the Southern Campaign: Benjamin Lincoln.” In The Revolutionary War in the South: Power, Conflict, and Leadership, edited by W. Robert Higgins, 101–131. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1979. Mattern, David B. Benjamin Lincoln and the American Revolution. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1995. Shipton, Clifford K. “Benjamin Lincoln: Old Reliable.” In George Washington’s Generals and Opponents: Their Exploits and Leadership, edited by George Athan Billias, 193–211. 1964. Reprint, New York: Da Capo, 1994.

Linear Tactics Linear tactics take their name from the infantry formation favored by commanders in battles of the American Revolutionary War period. Regiments in the Continental Army were identified by the state name with the words Continental Line or line, as in Virginia Line, Pennsylvania Line, and Continental Line. The term became a badge of honor, as these were the regiments expected to stand firm in the line of battle. The basic infantry weapon of the American Revolutionary War was the smoothbore flintlock musket. More accurate rifled muskets existed, but they could take as much as a minute or two to load, owing to fouling,

160 | Linear Tactics

the buildup of residue in the bore from the black powder employed. The smoothbore musket, however, could be loaded and fired three or four times more rapidly. Thus, in late eighteenth-century warfare, rifles came to be used by skirmishers and for longrange sniping, especially against enemy officers. The smoothbore musket could be loaded more quickly thanks to its greater windage (the difference between the bullet and the bore). However, this meant that the bullet bounded down the bore in what was known as balloting and might exit the muzzle at an angle, which meant that it was not very accurate. The musket’s lack of accuracy meant that the two sides in a battle might close with relative impunity to near dueling pistol range of 50–80 yards apart. Drawn up thus, standing shoulder to shoulder in ranks two to three men deep, they would trade volleys until one side gave way either because of excess casualties or from a bayonet charge. Engagements in such circumstances could be extremely costly in terms of casualties, and this helps explain the concentration on drill and discipline. Close-order training was essential so as to deploy a large number of men quickly in line and then control their movements and firing as well as to hold ranks while under enemy fire. It was essential to have as many muskets as possible firing in volley at the enemy. King Frederick II of Prussia (r. 1740–1786) squeezed the maximum from this with his well-drilled troops and massed firepower. Frederick popularized the oblique formation, in which he would feint a frontal attack and then slip his main forces to the enemy flank, positioning them quickly so that his entire line was at an angle to that of the enemy and thus able to concentrate its own entire fire while the enemy could only reply with a portion of his own. Success in this

would enable Frederick to roll up the enemy line. Firing was by volley, so regular drills to ensure speed were essential. Loading and firing were by command, with Continental Army major general Friedrich von Steuben’s drill having a dozen separate commands. While some units claimed four or five rounds per minute, the usual rate for a well-drilled Continental Army unit would have been three times a minute. The process slowed, of course, as firing continued and fouling of the weapons increased, not to mention the confusion caused by casualties. The rate of fire might diminish to as little as one round per minute in a prolonged battle. The socket bayonet affixed to the musket was an important weapon in linear tactics. If the commander of one side ordered a charge, the attackers might receive one last volley from the defenders (assuming the defenders were in ranks two deep), and this would not be truly effective unless the defenders waited until the very last moment before the two sides closed to hand combat range. Contemporary commanders believed that such discipline took years to instill. A welldrilled battalion could not have more than one-third raw recruits to be effective, and for this reason, commanders sought to avoid battle except under the most favorable circumstances. Combat was often broken off prematurely, and even victors seldom dared launch a pursuit in depth of a defeated foe for fear of losing control of their own troops. One innovation of the period was the increasing numbers of skirmishers. These lightly armed, loosely ordered, and highly expendable troops were sent forward along and in advance of the line of battle to locate enemy positions, secure prisoners, and gather intelligence. The defeat of a British army under Major General Edward Braddock in

Logistics, British | 161



the Battle of the Monongahela in 1755, during the French and Indian War (1754–1763), gave further impetus to the development of specific units of skirmishers, elite groups that became known in the British Army as light infantry. Ultimately, there was one such company per regiment in the British Army. Whereas the emphasis for the regular infantry was on rate of fire, with little attention given to marksmanship, the reverse was true for the British and Continental Army light infantry and the German jägers. One thing to remember about the eighteenth-century battlefield is the amount of smoke. After the second or third volley, the opposing side would be largely obscured from view thanks to the massive amount of smoke generated by the discharge of the black powder. Although some Continental Army generals, such as Charles Lee and Horatio Gates, believed that Americans lacked the discipline necessary to compete with the British and German professional forces and should adopt different tactics if they were to have any hope of victory, General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, demurred, and the Continental Army’s tactics largely resembled those of the British. Although America, with its far greater number of woodlands than Europe, forced both sides to modify their tactics on occasion, the line of battle typified the major clashes, and thanks to von Steuben’s hard work at Valley Forge in the winter of 1777–1778 and afterward, the Continental Army was ultimately able to compete on an equal basis with its professional British and German counterparts. Militiamen, however, lacked the discipline of the regulars; when placed in the line of battle, they often bolted under fire, much to the disparagement of Washington and other Continental Army commanders. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Duffy, Christopher. The Military Experience in the Age of Reason. New York: Atheneum, 1988. Steuben, Baron von. Regulations and Orders for the Order and Discipline of the Troops of the United States. 1779. Reprint, Charleston, SC: Nabu, 2012. Wright, John W. Some Notes on the Continental Army. Cornwallville, NY: Hope Farm, 1963.

Logistics, British British logistical organization at the start of the American Revolutionary War could best be described as complex. No less than three departments were responsible for supplying the military, and four claimed some part in transporting it. Within this system, the navy, the principal military arm of the British Empire, enjoyed considerably more autonomy than the army. The navy’s Victualling Board, for example, procured both provisions and the transport needed to move supplies in support of the seagoing arm, while the Navy Board obtained the materials needed for shipbuilding. The army, in contrast, remained at the mercy of a greater number of institutions outside its own control. The treasury secured provisions for the British ground forces and, until 1779, the victualing ships required to move these stores where they were needed. The army turned to the Navy Board to acquire troop transports and, after 1779, vessels to move its provisions. Finally, the Board of Ordnance retained responsibility for supplying and transporting British artillery and engineers while also procuring arms, ammunition, and additional equipment for the army. The challenges posed by the American Revolutionary War in the need to support a

162 | Logistics, British

military force separated from its logistical base by the vast Atlantic Ocean proved daunting. As the army controlled limited portions of American territory, it could only acquire local provisions through purchase or raids. Indeed, the necessity to procure both fresh meat and fodder for animals locally compelled the British to adopt an extensive foraging posture. This strategy rendered British troops, spread thin to maximize their yield, vulnerable to attack from either the Continental Army or, as in New Jersey in the winter and spring of 1776– 1777, local partisan groups acting on behalf of the rebellion. All other provisions needed to be shipped from across the Atlantic. To be sure, the British enjoyed temporary abundance of provisions when they occupied New York in 1776 and Philadelphia in 1777. Inevitably, however, these local sources of food dwindled within a matter of months. Delays introduced by weather, bureaucracy, and the contractors charged with producing and providing the supplies all compounded an already difficult task. The demand for shipping alone stretched British seafaring capacity to its limits and beyond. It is estimated that each man serving in the colonies required the transport of a third of a ton of provisions annually. However, this approximation did not include the weight of the packaging, such as wooden casks, in which the food and supplies were shipped. In 1782, the army alone consumed more than 120,000 tons of supplies transported from Europe. In terms of troop transport, each battalion deployed to the colonies required four ships to move all of its soldiers. The movement of horses required specially constructed vessels with sufficient room to ensure the likelihood that the animals would survive the arduous oceanic journey. All of these pressures, coupled with the unwillingness of the navy to assist

the army in transporting its supplies before 1779, exposed considerable shortages in British shipping capacity. The need for transport compelled the Navy Board to turn to European ports in an effort to secure the required number of vessels. Shortages surfaced in manpower as well. With the Navy Board, the Victualling Board, the treasury, and the Board of Ordnance all competing for crews, the government turned to such measures as impressments, the forcible enlistment of individuals into sea service, and the passage of laws allowing British ships to sail with predominantly foreign crews. Seeking to impose efficiency on what had become a chaotic system of supply distribution, the navy assumed control over all transport shipping in 1779. A change in the methodology of shipment from Britain accompanied this centralization of bureaucratic control. Prior to the switch, the treasury armed each individual merchant vessel to protect it from American privateers and subsequently sent these supply transports by themselves to the colonies as soon as they had been loaded. The navy believed that victualing ships should sail unarmed in convoys and thus delayed shipment until fleets of transports could be assembled. This change in technique meant that, on average, only three large convoys would cross the Atlantic each year. The transport of supplies proved equally challenging on land. The demands of providing for an eighteenth-century army required a considerable train of wagons to support forces in the field. Each soldier’s normal ration consisted of a pound of bread and a pound of meat each day, supplemented by additional foods, such as peas, as they became available. While these rations might be reduced when the force went on campaign, an army of 20,000 went through



more than 30 tons of provisions each day. The typical wagon employed by the British could carry 1 ton of supplies. As soldiers were expected to carry a three- to four-day supply themselves, each additional day spent on campaign required an additional 30 or more wagons to haul the necessary provisions. A great many more vehicles were needed to transport fodder for the horses and other types of equipment essential during campaigns, such as tents, axes, and kettles. Thus, in the early years of the war, Lieutenant General Sir William Howe, the commander in chief of the British forces in America, found his army in constant need of wagons with which to move provisions and equipment. Indeed, contractors rented most of the army’s wagons from local providers on a daily or monthly basis. This approach proved costly during the winter of 1776– 1777. Once encamped in winter quarters, the British Army, hoping to reduce expenditures, dismissed its rented wagon train. Subsequent American attacks at Trenton (December 26) and Princeton (January 3), coupled with the lack of wagons, forced the British to abandon large supply concentrations intended to provide for their troops throughout the cold season. In response, the quartermaster general’s department organized a new system in which wagons and the animals that pulled them remained under constant contract. Supply problems continued to plague the British in 1778. Though shortages in transport had been more or less resolved, the system of indent by which officials in America projected and requested the future supply needs of the army failed to match actual rates of consumption. It remained unclear to bureaucrats in London whether the requisitions of Commissary General Daniel Wier, the officer in charge of supply in the

Logistics, British | 163

colonies, included refugees from recently evacuated Philadelphia and the British garrison in Rhode Island. Furthermore, as Wier had only recently occupied his post in America, he was only beginning to grasp that there existed considerable inaccuracies in the inventories of provisions on hand at the start of the year. Consequently, in a span of seven months, the army consumed 3.5 million pounds of bread and flour and 2 million pounds of meat in addition to the initial projections. Shortages in the summer led Major General Charles Grey to launch a foraging expedition in the vicinity of Martha’s Vineyard, capturing more than 10,000 sheep and 300 cattle. However, this boon only supplied the army with meat for two weeks. Indeed, throughout the conflict, the British found themselves in the position of devoting large numbers of men to foraging. As early efforts by smaller parties to scrounge provisions increasingly fell victim to American attacks, the British employed ever greater covering forces with the foraging parties to provide protection. This technique of supply drained manpower from the main army and thus limited the aggressiveness with which British commanders could pursue operations. Shipping problems, not foraging, hindered British operations in 1780. Delays caused by poor weather and contractors slow to deliver goods postponed the departure of both scheduled convoys in 1779– 1780. Consequently, shipping was not available on time to transport provisions assembled for the 1780–1781 campaign. The resulting precarious supply situation severely affected British efforts to conduct the war. Newly appointed commander in chief Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton, eager to capitalize on General Lord Charles Cornwallis’s successes in the South and

164 | Logistics, Patriot

with only two and a half months’ worth of provisions on hand, felt constrained in operations until he received word that the next supply convoy would be departing England soon, a message that did not arrive until mid-October. Unsure of when the next shipment of supplies might arrive, Clinton passed on the opportunity to recapture Newport, Rhode Island, and thereby deny Americans and their French allies the use of that valuable port. Even Cornwallis’s Southern expedition in 1780 and 1781 suffered from problems of supply. Determined to defeat American major general Nathanael Greene’s force in North Carolina, Cornwallis abandoned both his base of supply in South Carolina and his own trains of provisions so as to render his command more mobile. When the British commander finally forced Greene to battle at Guilford Courthouse on March 15, 1781, his exhausted and malnourished troops, though successful in capturing the field, had no energy left to continue the pursuit. In the end, logistical considerations remained a constant concern of the British military leadership and certainly limited the scale of some operations. Be that as it may, the institutions charged with providing for the armed forces largely accomplished what they set out to do. James K. Perrin Jr.

Further Reading Bowler, R. Arthur. Logistics and the Failure of the British Army in America, 1775–1783. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1975. Fischer, David Hackett. Washington’s Crossing. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. Mackesy, Piers. The War for America, 1775– 1783. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1964.

Syrett, David. Shipping and the American War 1775–83: A Study of British Transport Organization. New York: Oxford University Press, 1970.

Logistics, Patriot Logistics refers to the administration of all supplies, transportation, weapons, and equipment needed for military missions. While the term postdates the American Revolutionary War, outcomes of most campaigns depended on factors that would in later years be designated logistical. Throughout the American Revolutionary War, state governments, congressional committees, bureaucratic functionaries, private contractors, and commanding officers all struggled to support a complex array of military organizations that were each undergoing institutional self-invention. How this design and experimentation could have succeeded while the Patriots and their allies fought protracted engagements against the forces of the powerful British Empire continues to amaze historians. Early in 1775, as civil protests erupted into war, new roles for American political institutions were emerging in and among the colonies. Long before Patriot leaders would formally enunciate the conflict as a war for independence, provision had to be made for the informal “Army of New England,” which was assembling around Boston and raiding British positions on Lake Champlain. The distribution of the related financial burdens became the initial test of these new political institutions. In many ways, these preparations shaped the compromises that would make nationhood plausible. The rebellion seemed like a New England project during the early months, especially



between the outbreak of hostilities at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, and mid-June, when the Continental Congress resolved to assume more responsibility for the Provisional Army at Boston. Local militias had been stockpiling supplies but not in the quantities necessary to sustain a siege force of 10,000–12,000 men around Boston, which lasted until March 17, 1776. Tradi­ tionally, each town provided the food for its own militia members. Some militiamen thus enjoyed fresh and adequate rations, while others received very little. The stock of tents, gunpowder, and weapons was even less dependable. The Second Continental Congress, which was not a government but a conference of delegates representing provisional governments, convened in May 1775 at Philadelphia. Among its first business, Congress heard—and tabled—a formal call for help from the provisional government of Massachusetts. But by the end of the month, Congress had empowered a new committee to acquire military provisions. Presuming that the states would repay the debts, Congress authorized gunpowder purchases on credit in early June. This initial gunpowder fixation foreshadowed the outcome of the Battle of Bunker Hill (June 17), when wellfortified Americans would withstand two British assaults only to yield after the engaged troops ran out of ammunition. Historians usually condemn Congress’s logistical administration after Bunker Hill, pointing to legislators’ sluggish debates in the face of urgent military need. Certainly, Congress was slow to delegate its control over resupply and transportation. Although this shortcoming could be viewed as a symptom of Whig antiauthoritarian bias, in retrospect, the apparent chaos of multiple supply channels, divided political powers, conflicting priorities, inexperience, and the

Logistics, Patriot | 165

unforeseen commencement of hostilities all conspired to ensure that Patriot logistics would remain comparatively decentralized even if usually inadequate. Continental resupply efforts would survive the earliest and most vulnerable stages of the American Revolution, when any one of several crises might have overwhelmed a more centrally organized schema. General George Washington, the new Continental Army commander, spent several days with Congress at Philadelphia in mid-June 1775. He helped secure the appointment of Joseph Trumbull as commissary of stores and provisions and Walter Livingston as commissary general for the Northern Army. In August, Washington named Thomas Mifflin the quartermaster general. These three appointees, with very few deputies, were expected to account for, deliver, and issue all of the food, equipment, ammunition, clothing, transportation, and quartering services for approximately 20,000 Continental soldiers. Congress retained control over the Patriot purse, initially restricting procurement to committees composed entirely of congressmen. Washington then proceeded to his headquarters near Boston, where he took command on July 3, 1775, in the aftermath of Bunker Hill. After inspecting the lines and calling for an accurate inventory of men, arms, and supplies, Washington made his first report to Congress. In the report, he complained about shortages of tents and clothing for the soldiers. He also urged Congress to provide him with money that would facilitate the quick procurement of necessities. But in his most insistent request, Washington called for gunpowder. Days later, Washington began issuing general orders, guiding subordinate officers in the basics of military readiness: cleanliness, food preparation, latrine maintenance,

166 | Logistics, Patriot

and trash removal. These directives also banned gunpowder waste by prohibiting target practice and long-distance sniping. As Washington concerned himself with these logistical and disciplinary tasks, Congress made tentative progress in procuring gunpowder and other supplies. By early August 1775, just enough powder was on hand for each soldier to shoot a musket nine times. By fall, the powder crisis had subsided slightly, to about a dozen rounds per soldier. Still, it was not until the Siege of Yorktown (September 28–October 19, 1781) that Americans carried the per capita 60 rounds typically issued to the British regular on extended march. Congress’s Committee of Safety— responsible for arms, ammunition, soldiers, and forts—toyed with creating a cottage industry for domestic gunpowder. Instructions for making gunpowder could be found in several newspapers, and state governments and Congress offered cash bonuses. Powder mills began generating it in small capacities. Aside from its demoralizing effect on their enemies, however, the value of this initiative should not be exaggerated. Throughout the war, most of the gunpowder used by Patriot soldiers would be purchased from France, the Netherlands, and Spain or captured from the British. In early 1776, weapons became more of a crisis than powder. By January, most army enlistments had expired. Recruits joined the new Continental Army as most veterans departed. But only 100 muskets were retained by the Continental Army. The rest were pilfered by homeward-bound veterans, or in a more likely explanation, the weapons departed with their rightful owners. Fortu­ nately for the Americans, the British remained unaware of this crisis and took little notice of American reenlistment difficulties.

That spring, in the then most important logistical operation to date, approximately 60 pieces of heavy artillery that had been captured the previous year at Fort Ticonderoga finally arrived at Washington’s headquarters. The epic tale of its delivery by Colonel Henry Knox and his men, who dragged these weapons over the Berkshire Mountains on sledges in the depths of winter, has achieved iconic status. The emplacement of this artillery on Dorchester Heights forced the British decision to abandon Boston in March 1776. Even as the British sailed from Boston, General Washington grappled with his next major logistical challenge: the Continental Army must be moved into defensive positions in New York, and the redcoats already had a substantial head start. In the summer of 1776, Patriot logistics became more complicated as Great Britain mustered its then largest-ever transatlantic military expedition while Washington rushed the American army from Boston to New York. In June, Congress formed its Board of War and gave it broad responsibility for weaponry, recruitment, supplies, and prisoners of war. With his own army grossly outnumbered, Washington strove to preserve the rebellion by avoiding decisive defeat. For as long as the army could survive, the rebellion would endure. And while the rebellion continued, Britain bore the exploding costs of maintaining armies and navies on a war footing thousands of miles from home. If France could be enticed into the war as an American ally, Britain would be forced to weigh the costs of a global war against the dubious commercial prospects for cooperation from a conquered populace, so during the 1776 campaigning from Long Island to Trenton, the Americans conducted extended retreats under fire punctuated with infrequent and opportunistic counterattacks.



Struggling to fund these maneuvers, Congress issued paper currency and purchased supplies on credit. The value of these debt instruments fluctuated with the most recent reports from the meandering front. For most of 1776, Continental prospects dimmed, and the resulting currency inflation made purchasing more difficult. In late November, with the capture of Fort Lee (November 20), the Continental Army lost hundreds of tents, precious gunpowder, and most of its artillery assets. On December 26, a desperate attack against Hessianoccupied Trenton, New Jersey, succeeded, helping to replenish some of the needed supplies and bolstering sagging morale. But the most tangible benefit from the Trenton attack was the impact of the news on negotiations between the Patriot diplomat Benjamin Franklin and the French government. With tentative French cooperation, the dire gunpowder shortages were mitigated during the summer of 1777, enabling bolder American action for the dramatic campaigns. In short order, the seat of American government fell to the British in Philadelphia, causing Congress to scatter to York, Pennsylvania. Then, on October 17, a British army surrendered near Saratoga, New York. It was during this hectic year that Congress attempted sweeping changes to its logistics administration. Forming a new Board of War, reorganizing the Hospital Department, adding new staff officers, and splitting the functions of purchasing and issuing in the Commissary Departments in the hopes of better accountability, Congress cracked down on corruption. Several overworked and key officials resigned, including both the commissary and quartermaster generals. Resulting gridlock exacerbated shortages of food, wagons, and teams just as Washington moved his haggard forces

Logistics, Patriot | 167

into winter quarters at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. The suffering soldiers at Valley Forge have come to symbolize the failures born of politicians meddling in military matters. Similar notions of the army’s eventual deliverance through leadership, perseverance, drill, and providential favor reside in the canon of nationalistic historiography. Biting criticism that winter of 1777–1778 spurred Congress to reform its Board of War. The result was a more independent board that included fewer congressmen. The outgoing commissary general and the former quartermaster general were given positions on the new board, and Major General Horatio Gates, the hero of Saratoga, became its chairman. Most significantly, Congress aligned the authority for purchasing and transportation squarely within the army command structure. The logistics problems of the Continental Army did not dissipate with the coming of spring. Inflation, deficit spending, and uncoordinated purchasing efforts led to higher costs and continued shortages through the duration of hostilities. But with the February 1778 announcement that France had firmly allied with the American rebels, the war turned global. The Royal Navy could no longer sustain American blockades with its attention drawn to the expanding conflict in the Caribbean Sea, the Indian Ocean, and the English Channel. The colonial military effort became largely a guerrilla operation in the southern states and a containment operation near British-held Manhattan. The war was not over, but Patriot political and military institutions had survived the most vulnerable stages. Indeed, Britain’s waning ability to sustain the war and France’s determination to help the rebels, whom the French believed would help themselves, ensured that the

168 | Long Island, Battle of

worst of the logistical problems would be things of the past. Joe Petrulionis

Further Reading Bodle, Wayne. The Valley Forge Winter: Civilians and Soldiers in War. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2002. Carp, E. Wayne. To Starve the Army at Pleasure: Continental Army Administration and American Political Culture, 1775– 1783. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1984. Huston, James A. Logistics of Liberty: American Services of Supply in the Revolutionary War and After. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1991.

Long Island, Battle of (August 27, 1776) The Battle of Long Island in New York (August 27, 1776), also known as the Battle of Brooklyn and the Battle of Brooklyn Heights, marked the commencement of the British New York campaign (July– November 1776). It was also the first battle in which an army of the United States was engaged (independence having been declared only the month before). The Commander of British forces, General Sir William Howe, had evacuated Boston in March 1776. General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, correctly assumed that the next British offensive move would be against the strategically important port city of New York, at the southern end of Manhattan Island. Its excellent harbor would provide a fine anchorage for the British fleet, and as Washington warned in a letter to Colonel William Alexander, known as Lord Stirling, who had charge of constructing

defenses on Long Island, if the British were to gain control of New York, they would then be in position to move up the Hudson River (then known as the North River) and “stop the Intercourse between the northern and southern Colonies, upon which depends the Safety of America.” British control of the strategic Hudson waterway would provide easy access to Canada and enable them to isolate New England, the font of the rebellion. Retaining New York, Washington believed, was of “infinite importance.” Reposing great confidence in his youngest general, in late March, Washington gave Brigadier General Nathanael Greene (who would be promoted to major general on August 9) command of Long Island, sending Greene south from Boston with his brigade of five regiments. Defense of Long Island was centered on Brooklyn Heights, a commanding topographical feature that rose some 100 feet over the water and overlooked the East River to Manhattan Island and New York City itself. The Americans understood the importance of Dorchester Heights in reducing Boston. They did not want to see the British turn the tables in New York City. Greene’s brigade labored to complete the defensive works begun by Major General Charles Lee even before the evacuation of Boston and, following Lee’s departure for the South, by Colonel Alexander. When completed, the zigzag American defensive line covered a distance of about one and a half miles across a peninsula from Gowanus Cover in the southwest to Wallabout Bay in the northeast. It included five forts, one of which was named Fort Greene, and a number of redoubts. In all, the positions mounted 29 cannon. Behind the works lay Brooklyn, the East River, and just beyond that, on Manhattan Island, Washington’s headquarters. However, there was a serious



geographical drawback that Greene could not surmount. Long Island was surrounded by deep navigable water, and the British commanded the sea. The American 18-pounders at Red Hook, the extreme westerly position on the fortified peninsula, would be no match for the 32-pounder cannon carried by the Royal Navy’s ships of the line. Washington had ample time to prepare the New York defenses, for Howe took considerable time to launch his next move. Howe did not open the second phase of the war until June 1776 when he set sail from Halifax with 32,000 infantry in hundreds of transports convoyed by 10 ships of the line and 20 frigates, all manned by 10,000 seamen in what was the largest expeditionary force in British history until the twentieth century. The advance elements of the

Long Island, Battle of | 169

British force arrived off New York on June 29, and on July 3, British troops began coming ashore on Staten Island. At the same time, another British force of 13,500 troops under the British commander in Canada, Lieutenant General Sir Guy Carleton, was preparing to advance from the north down the Richelieu River–Lake Champlain invasion route. To oppose Howe’s force, Washington had just 19,000 men at New York. Not knowing where the British would strike, Washington had divided his forces between Manhattan and Long Island. With the British amassing landing craft in the area, he feared that the British would strike simultaneously at both northern Manhattan Island and a second location. To not be outflanked, he formed his men into five divisions, which he stationed in three major bodies: three divisions

George Washington withdrawing from Long Island. Following the Patriot defeat in the battle on August 27, 1776, Washington, on the night of August 29–30, successfully evacuated the army to Manhattan and was among the last to depart. (National Archives)

170 | Long Island, Battle of

at the southern end of Manhattan Island; one near the northern end of Manhattan at Fort Washington, located on Mount Washington (present-day Washington Heights) on the Hudson River; and one on Long Island. Yet, Washington placed his forces so far forward that they were in fact vulnerable to a flanking attack. Although Howe mounted such attacks, he too would be slow in pressing them home, allowing Washington to escape each time. Congress had made no provision for cavalry, and Washington likewise made no attempt to organize such a force on his own. He had available to him a regiment of 400– 500 volunteers from Connecticut, known as the Light Dragoons, but he did not think to make use of them and indeed sent them home. Even a small screening force might have prevented defeat. On the evening of July 9, on Washington’s orders, the New York troops gathered at their respective parade grounds and received news of the Declaration of Independence, which had been adopted by Congress a few days before in Philadelphia. The men cheered, and in New York’s Bowling Green, a patriotic crowd toppled and destroyed a leaden statue of King George III. Much to Washington’s surprise, Howe was slow to act. At the beginning of August, Howe was reinforced by ships and men who had been repulsed in the Battle of Sullivan’s Island, near Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, on June 28. Yet, it was not until two months after his arrival, on August 22, that Howe pressed his advantage and began landing 20,000 men on Long Island. Greene was not in command on Long Island when the British invaded. During the previous several weeks, many of his men had fallen sick with what was probably typhoid. Greene himself was felled on August 15, confined to bed with a high fever

and no energy. Washington ordered Greene to cross to Manhattan and complete his recuperation there, replacing him with Major General Israel Putnam, Greene’s second-in-command. Washington then reconsidered his choice and named the more seasoned Major General John Sullivan as commander; however, he was ignorant of Greene’s defensive plans. Washington also increased troop strength on Long Island from 4,000–9,000 men. By now, he had at his disposal some 28,000 men, but many of these were untrained militiamen. On August 22, about 15,000 British troops landed on the southwest shore of Gravesend Bay on Long Island without opposition. A long ridge ran east–west across the island, known as the Heights of Guan; it was pierced by four passes. From west to east, these were Gowanus Road, Flatbush Road, Bedford Pass, and Jamaica Pass. Howe feinted an attack against Flatbush Road and Bedford Pass, causing Sullivan to concentrate the bulk of his forces in these locations. Then, on the night of August 26, Howe led the main body of some 10,000 men east in a wide movement in front of the American positions and through Jamaica Pass on the extreme left of the Continental Army. The British attackers then moved west again, behind the American positions. With the British threatening to cut them off, the outnumbered Americans in Bedford Pass and Flatbush broke and fell back on the fortified Brooklyn Heights. At the same time, Major General James Grant led the remaining 5,000 British troops against the extreme right of the American line at Gowanus Pass. Grant’s job was to fix in place there some 1,600 Americans now under Brigadier General Alexander until Howe could cut them off from the rear. To lull the Americans, Grant moved cautiously.



Putnam never did comprehend what the British were doing, and as a result, in the Battle of Long Island on August 27, the Americans on the Gowanus Road were caught between two British forces nearly 10 times their own number and forced to surrender. Fearing disaster, Washington crossed the East River and took personal command of the American forces on Brooklyn Heights. The logical course was to extract his men and withdraw them across the East River, but Washington was at first unwilling to consider it. Instead, he ordered reinforcements from Manhattan to Long Island, increasing his strength there to 9,500 men. The British might now have taken a sizable part of the Continental Army, and perhaps even its commander, but Howe shrank from the frontal assault on the American position on Brooklyn Heights that the Americans expected. No doubt Howe remembered what had happened in the Battle of Bunker Hill (June 17, 1775). But he also did not make use of his naval power to cut the Americans off from escape. Instead, he ordered the digging of siege lines, expecting that Washington would recognize the hopelessness of his position and surrender. Heavy rains delayed the British preparations and also provided time for Washington to realize the precariousness of his situation. In consequence, in a brilliant

Long Island, Battle of | 171

operation, Washington ordered campfires kept burning and, on the night of August 29–30, thanks in part to heavy fog, transported all his men and all but six of his cannon across the East River to Manhattan in boats manned by Marblehead, Massachusetts, fishermen. Washington was the last man on the last boat, departing just as the British came up. The Americans suffered 1,012 killed, wounded, or captured in the Long Island campaign; Howe reported his losses as 59 killed, 268 wounded, and 31 missing. Although the British celebrated the victory, there was some criticism that the Royal Navy had permitted Washington and the bulk of the American defenders to escape. After another delay, Howe proceeded against Manhattan, landing forces at Kips Bay on September 15. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Lengel, Edward. General George Washington. New York: Random House, 2005. McCullough, David. 1776. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2006. Tucker, Spencer C. Rise and Fight Again: The Life of General Nathanael Greene. Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2009. Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. Edited by John Alden. New York: Macmillan, 1952.

M Militias, Loyalist and Patriot

colonies in America, citizenship for all males required that they also be soldiers. Until the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), England rarely committed regular army troops to duty in the colonies. The settlers were pretty much on their own as they fought Indians and the occasional Frenchmen, and the militia system took deep root. The same thing happened in Britain in the 1700s as the middle class grew and the militias were gentrified; as local militias spread throughout the kingdom, they were officered by the nobility and local leaders. When British Army troops were drawn to America in the 1770s, these militia units assumed the responsibility for territorial defense, playing much the same role as American militias. Legally, in both Britain and America, the militia included all able-bodied freeborn male citizens between the ages of 16 and 60 (except in Britain only Protestants served). Every man was required to own a musket, a bayonet or sword, gunpowder, and ball. In some colonies, militiamen also had to own a tomahawk. Slaves, indentured servants, Indians, and paupers were not allowed to join. Almost universally, many men in important or respected occupations were exempt from militia duty, including fishermen, schoolteachers, clergymen, doctors, legislators, college professors, and sea captains. All militiamen were required to assemble in their communities for a number of muster days each year to learn the rudiments of drill and military execution. And, of course, they were obligated to spring to arms

Militias were units of citizen soldiers who fought on both sides in the American War of Independence, usually as supplements to regular troops. Patriot militias were far more widespread because Loyalist Americans were suppressed by the rebels and could only organize when the British Army was in possession of parts of the colonies. Both British and Continental officers disparaged the militiamen for their lack of military discipline, their wastefulness of supplies when in camp, and their panicstricken flights at times when under fire on the battlefield. For years, historians tended to agree with these officers, minimizing the contributions of the militias and even asserting that the system was an utter failure. More recent studies, while admitting the shortcomings of militiamen, tend to emphasize the achievements of the citizen soldiers, arguing that they should not be judged by the same standards as regulars. On the British side, militiamen sometimes supplemented the troops who could be fielded for an army living at the end of a 3,000-mile supply line. For the Patriots, the militias played a vital role as local police forces, suppressing the large number of Loyalists and otherwise maintaining rebel control while General George Washington, the commander in chief of the Continental Army, and his officers fought the British on the battlefield. British and American militias had a common origin in medieval English trainbands. From the very beginning of the British 173

174 | Militias, Loyalist and Patriot

whenever there was a threat to their colony. By the eighteenth century, these muster days were a huge joke, essentially social occasions that served no military purpose. With impunity, many citizen soldiers skipped them altogether. In America in 1774, these slack practices quickly came to an end. At that time, the British Parliament passed the Coercive Acts, and indignant American colonists rallied behind Massachusetts to protest these measures. King George III declared all the colonies in rebellion, and they responded by creating extralegal governments to defend their English rights. They also made sweeping changes in their militia systems, purging any officers who were loyal to the king, requiring that militiamen swear an oath of loyalty to their colony instead of the Crown, and scrambling to arm, drill, and regularize expanded militia armies. The Loyalists, although numbering at least one-fourth of the colonies’ population, were surprised by these measures and were quickly brought into submission to the emerging rebel political and military structure. Pennsylvania, which had no militia system in 1773, quickly put together an impressive military organization to protest Britain’s coercion of the colonies. The New England colonies, on the front line of protest in early 1775, made some of the most remarkable strides in reforming their militias. Lieutenant General Thomas Gage, the British commander in chief in America, had 4,000 troops at his disposal in Boston and posed an imminent threat to all rebels within marching distance of them. By the spring of 1775, Massachusetts alone had 14,000 militiamen armed and organized into 47 regiments. Twenty-one of these, numbering 7,400 men, were minutemen regiments. The other New England colonies also had minute companies,

specially chosen and trained elite troops. In an emergency, they would fight British regulars as skirmishers and sharpshooters, firing from concealed forward positions and then falling back. Familiar with the land, they were highly mobile fighters who rapidly deployed as needed while other militiamen were mobilizing. On four separate occasions in early 1775, the militiamen quickly formed to resist Gage’s various forays into the countryside. The last excursion, on April 19, to Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, set off a shooting war that for months had threatened to erupt. Brigadier General Hugh Earl Percy and Lieutenant Colonel Francis Smith, commanding almost 2,000 British soldiers, marched relatively unhindered to Concord, but on their return to Boston, they were engaged in a 15-mile-long running battle with 4,000 minutemen and militia. They were entirely unprepared for the rebels’ irregular tactics of firing from cover, constantly moving, keeping their distance, and sniping at officers. Expecting to meet ragtag, disorganized fighters, they instead faced well-trained, well-armed, and motivated citizens who believed that they were defending their families and homes. Lord Percy was particularly impressed, warning the government in London that a war with Americans would not be short or easy. He was ignored. Militias in other colonies also became active in 1775. In Virginia, militia units compelled Royal Governor John Murray, 4th Earl of Dunmore, to seek safety offshore in a British warship. William Tryon, the royal governor of New York, suffered a similar fate. During the Siege of Boston (April 19, 1775–March 17, 1776), although they were victorious, the British underwent another mauling at the hands of militiamen in the Battle of Bunker Hill on June 17,



1775. By December, militia units from many colonies, numbering 14,000 men, had blockaded a reinforced British army of 6,000 troops in Boston. When General Washington reached Cambridge, Massachusetts, on July 2, the militia’s role as the mainstay of the war for America was at an end. Washington and his officers regularized the military forces, adopting many of the colonial militia regiments into the Continental Army and leaving others as militia units. These new regulars, enlisted at first for one year and later for three years or the duration of the war, came under the control of the Continental Congress. There now emerged in America an argument between supporters of militia forces on the one hand and advocates of a disciplined regular army on the other. This would be a long-standing controversy. During the revolution, militia supporters were generally small-government men, those who feared strong centralized authority and saw regular armies as a threat to their liberties. Regular army disciples, known as nationalists, favored stronger central power and disliked the laxness and indiscipline of militia forces. Washington and many of his generals, such as Philip Schuyler and Anthony Wayne, were mostly disgusted with militiamen. Others, such as Horatio Gates and Charles Lee, were much less critical. Lee even went so far as to argue that these troops could defeat Britain without the Continental Army. In the fighting around New York in 1776, Washington watched helplessly as 8,000 Connecticut militiamen went home without even informing him. He insisted to Congress that he must have a more permanent and effective military force. Yet, Washington was a realist, and he knew that many in Congress would not and, because of financial difficulties, could not

Militias, Loyalist and Patriot | 175

create such an army. So, the war was fought with a combination of regulars and militiamen, with the militia soldiers performing well when they were well officered and well used, and sometimes abysmally when not. Washington was impressed in December 1776 when Brigadier General William Maxwell, leading 1,100 New Jersey militiamen, unmercifully harassed British supply lines and forced the British army to contract its lines. Continental officers Gates, Nathanael Greene, and Daniel Morgan were particularly effective in handling militia forces on the battlefield because they understood these troops’ strengths and weaknesses and did not expect them to do the impossible, that is, perform like regulars. Loyalist militiamen did not play as large a role in the revolution as their Patriot counterparts. The main reason was that British officers expended most of their military efforts with Loyalists in establishing a pro­ vincial corps in the regular military establishment. Fifty of these provincial units were created, enrolling 20,000 Loyalists as regular soldiers. The Queen’s Rangers, the Volunteers of Ireland, and the British Legion are examples of these units, and many of them distinguished themselves on the battlefield. Loyalist militias, or “associations,” on the other hand, enrolled only 10,000 American fighters during the war. Most of these were enlisted in South Carolina and Georgia in 1780–1781, after the British Army had temporarily suppressed rebel opposition in those two states. In May and June 1780, Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton, the British commander in chief, and his subordinate, Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis, drew up a plan for such militia forces in the South. Loyal young men who agreed to serve for 6 months out of 12 were organized into companies and battalions under the

176 | Monmouth, Battle of

ultimate command of British officers. They were paid for their services and were specifically admonished not to molest civilians who remained at peace in their own neighborhoods. As Cornwallis carried out the pacification of the South Carolina interior, he created “associations of loyal citizens” at Orangeburg, Ninety Six, Cheraw Hill, and other places. The primary task of these units was the same as the Patriot militias: to act as a local constabulary and maintain control of dissident citizens while Cornwallis warred against American armies. Prominent Loyalists such as Elias Ball and Robert Cunningham, chosen as much for their social standing as their military prowess, were given local command of these troops. Thousands of militiamen were enrolled, and on paper at least, the British pacification of the southern interior seemed to be proceeding according to plan. Loyalist militia regiments, like Patriot units, fought in a number of southern battles in 1780–1781. Despite these early appearances that Loyalist militia mobilization was working, the reality was quite different. After the British lost the Battle of Kings Mountain, South Carolina, on October 7, 1780, Royalist control of the Carolina backcountry, which had always been tenuous, began to dissolve. Patriot partisans under the leadership of Francis Marion, Thomas Sumter, Andrew Pickens, and others rose spontaneously against the British militias. A vicious civil war erupted throughout the backcountry, with both Loyalists and Patriots engaging in a reign of terror that scourged whole neighborhoods. Each side accused the other of banditry and plundering, while both sides murdered opponents in their beds. General Greene, the American commander in the South in 1781, was appalled by this vicious carnage, fearing that civil

society was on the verge of collapse. Cornwallis was equally upset, but the atrocities continued even after British troops withdrew to coastal enclaves at Charles Town (Charleston), Savannah, and Yorktown, Virginia, and the Loyalist militia system collapsed. When the British Army finally departed America in 1782, 6,500 Southern Loyalists departed with it, going into exile in Britain, Canada, the Bahamas, Bermuda, and the British West Indies. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Allen, Thomas B. Tories: Fighting for the King in America’s First Civil War. New York: HarperCollins, 2010. Calhoon, Robert M. The Loyalists in Revolutionary America, 1760–1781. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1973. Higginbotham, Don. War and Society in Revolutionary America: The Wider Dimensions of Conflict. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1984. Hoffman, Ronald, Thad W. Tate, and Peter J. Albert, eds. An Uncivil War: The Southern Backcountry during the American Revolution. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1985. Nelson, Paul David. “Citizen Soldiers or Regulars: The Views of American General Officers on the Military Establishment, 1775–1781.” Military Affairs 43 (1972): 126–132. Van Tyne, Claude H. The Loyalists in the American Revolution. New York: Macmillan, 1902.

Monmouth, Battle of (June 28, 1778) The Battle of Monmouth was an important battle in New Jersey in which the Continental Army attacked the British during their



withdrawal from Philadelphia. In early June 1778, General Sir William Howe resigned his commission as British commander in North America and was replaced by Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton, who then evacuated Philadelphia on orders from London. Since early May, General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, had been aware that the British were planning a general land movement of some sort, and he assumed correctly that they were about to quit Philadelphia. Positing a British march across New Jersey to New York, he ordered New Jersey major general of militia Philemon Dickinson to call up his men. Washington also ordered Brigadier General William Maxwell’s New Jersey brigade to Mount Holly. Washington hoped these forces might harass the British and slow their movement by destroying bridges and building obstructions. Washington’s assumption about enemy intentions was correct, for on June 16, two regiments of British troops departed Philadelphia before dawn, crossing the Delaware River at Cooper’s Point. The next day, June 17, Washington called a council of war and informed his generals that he believed that the British were evacuating Philadelphia. He put British strength at 10,000 men and Continental Army strength at 12,500 men, with 11,000 of the latter fit for service. Washington posed a series of questions to be answered. Among these were whether the Americans should attempt an immediate attack on the British in Philadelphia, whether the army should remain in its present location until the British completed their evacuation, or whether it should also cross the Delaware and attempt to attack the British during their march. Continental Army major general Charles Lee, who had been released in a prisoner exchange on April 5 after a year and a half

Monmouth, Battle of | 177

in British captivity, led the opposition to any attack. He argued that the British should be permitted to withdraw to New York unmolested, reasoning that the French alliance ensured an American victory in the war and that it was thus unwise to risk the army in a major stand-up battle. Although the generals did vote to follow the British at a discreet distance, almost all opposed an attack under most circumstances. Meanwhile, the last British troops departed Philadelphia on June 18, crossing the Delaware and moving to the northeast in an easy march. New York City lay 90 miles distant. Washington broke camp at Valley Forge the next day. Thanks to Quartermaster General Nathanael Greene’s prepositioning of supplies, the Americans were able to move faster than the British, who were slowed by a large supply train of some 1,000 wagons. Detaching small units to harass the British, Washington sent the main portion of the army north of and parallel to Clinton’s route. The leading American elements crossed the Delaware on June 20, but the last troops did not enter New Jersey until the evening of June 22. The next day, the British easily brushed aside a force of New Jersey militia at Crosswicks while the main body of Continentals entered Hopewell, about 20 miles to the north. Two days later, the British reached Allentown, only 15 miles from Washington at Hopewell. At Hopewell, on the morning of June 24, Washington held another council of war. With time quickly running out for an attack while the British were on the march, Washington asked his generals whether they would now approve a general attack. Led by Lee, the majority was still opposed. Greene then put forth a compromise: an assault by two brigades of light troops against the rear and flanks of the British column in conjunction with already positioned militia and

178 | Monmouth, Battle of

Continental Army units, with the rest of the army close by to participate if necessary. The council of war approved such an operation, but only with 1,500 men. Washington almost immediately received letters from both Greene and Major General Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, urging a greater commitment of troops and action. Lafayette even chided Washington for having called the council. Lafayette wrote that he, Greene, Major General Friedrich von Steuben, Brigadier General Anthony Wayne, and two other brigadier generals strongly advised Washington to employ 2,500 men in the planned attack rather than 1,500. For once, Washington decided to override one of his councils and committed neither the 1,500 men agreed to by his generals nor the 2,500 recommended by Lafayette and a minority of the generals but rather 4,000 men. The army as a whole would also relocate closer to the British. Clinton meanwhile had concluded that it was too dangerous to continue his march toward New Brunswick into terrain that would force him to string out his army and make it more vulnerable to attack and also risk encountering northern Patriot forces under Major General Horatio Gates. On the morning of June 25, Clinton changed the direction of the march to move through Monmouth County to high ground at Middletown. There he would be able to control an evacuation by sea from Sandy Hook. This route would take his army through Monmouth Court House. On June 25, Washington left his tents and heavy baggage behind at Hopewell and moved the army seven miles to Rocky Hill. This put the Americans on a converging line with the British. With a major engagement now imminent, Washington offered command of the advance element to Lee,

the senior general in the army next to Washington himself. Lee declined, whereupon Washington gave it to Lafayette. But when Lee learned that the command actually approached half the strength of the army, he requested it be shifted to him, and Washington agreed. This meant that the attack would be led by a man who had strongly opposed it. This shift in command was one of the major mistakes of Washington’s military career. With Lee commanding some 5,000 men near Englishtown, on the night of June 25, Washington moved the rest of the army from Kingston to Cranbury. Washington issued explicit orders to Lee to attack the rear of the British column the next day. He also instructed him to call a council of war and issue precise orders to his subordinates regarding the plan of attack. While Lee did indeed meet with his commanders, he simply told them that he had no set plan and that they should await his battlefield orders. The Battle of Monmouth was really two separate engagements fought on the same day. The fighting began about 8:00 a.m. several miles north of Monmouth Court House when Lee’s 5,000 men with 12 guns attacked the rear portion of the British column spread out over some 12 miles. The fighting occurred in intense heat (perhaps more than 100 degrees Fahrenheit) and clouds of dust. Indeed, the high temperature claimed a number of dead on both sides from heat exhaustion and sunstroke. Unknown to Washington, Clinton had strengthened his rear guard with some of his best troops and had given charge of it to his second-in-command, Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis. The battle opened when Wayne’s men skirmished with the British. With no other option, Clinton turned and engaged the Americans. Lee meanwhile showed great



caution and soon lost control of the situation, ordering units about in such fashion as to completely confuse his subordinates. After several hours of this, Lee’s units began to withdraw piecemeal. An angry Washington, seeing troops streaming past, could not understand what had transpired, and tradition has him swearing great oaths. He then rode forward and demanded an explanation from Lee, who could not explain his actions other than to say that he thought it was not then a good idea to fight a major engagement with the British. In fairness to Lee, he had not been with the army at Valley Forge and was thus not aware of its enhanced capabilities thanks to the training under von Steuben. Washington was furious, however. He told Lee that he expected his orders to be obeyed. Washington then took control of the battle himself. The second phase was in effect a Continental defense against the British counterattack. Greene played a key role. At the start of the battle, he had remained with Washington but in temporary command of Lee’s division on the American right, ready to move into action should the attack become a general engagement. Indeed, before the Americans had retreated, Washington had ordered Greene forward to support the attack, but as soon as Greene learned that Lee was retreating, he withdrew to be able to contain the British advance. Twice Greene’s men drove back furious British counterattacks, holding until the disorganized and retreating American left could be reorganized. The second phase of the battle saw perhaps 7,000 British troops attacking 12,000 Continentals. Washington positioned the main American line behind a hedgerow. The fighting was intense and in places manto-man, with the Americans performing well against the attacking British, even with

Monmouth, Battle of | 179

their bayonets. While the American center and left held, Washington sent Greene south around to the British left flank. The British then withdrew. Washington wanted to pursue, but his men were simply too spent from the battle and the heat. Clinton retired to Middletown and then Sandy Hook, where the British were lifted off by ship to New York City. The Battle of Monmouth ended as a Continental victory, but it was not the outcome that Washington had hoped for or expected. Continental Army losses were 152 killed and 300 wounded; British losses were 290 killed, 390 wounded, and 576 captured. Lee’s actions during the battle were such as to cause many in the army to think that he might have been actively working for the British. Indeed, there is some suggestion that he had turned traitor while held as a British prisoner. Following the battle, Lee demanded a court of inquiry. Being found guilty of misconduct, he resigned his commission. In the Battle of Monmouth, Washington’s army proved that it could fight on equal footing with the British Army. It was in fact the largest single day’s battle of the war. It was also the last general engagement in the North. Although there would be small engagements thereafter, the Northern theater now settled into stalemate and remained thus until the end of the war. Following the battle, Washington moved the army toward the Hudson River to keep close watch on Clinton. The army arrived in New Brunswick on July 4 and then moved to a more permanent location at White Plains on July 21. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Lengel, Edward G. General George Washington: A Military Life. New York: Random House, 2005.

180 | Morgan, Daniel Styker, William S. The Battle of Monmouth. Port Washington, NY: Kennikat, 2006. Tucker, Spencer C. Rise and Fight Again: The Life of General Nathanael Greene. Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2009. Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. Vol. 2. New York: Macmillan, 1952.

Morgan, Daniel(1736–1802) Continental Army officer Daniel Morgan was born in Hunterdon County, New Jersey, on July 6, 1736. In his teens, he migrated to the northern Shenandoah Valley in Virginia. He saw some action during the French and Indian War (1754–1763) and received an ensign’s commission in the Virginia Militia. In the mid-1760s, Morgan settled into farming near Winchester. With the beginning of the American Revolutionary War in 1775, he volunteered to lead Continental troops. On June 22, he was commissioned captain of a company of riflemen to be raised in Virginia. Within weeks, he and his company had joined General George Washington’s Continental Army in the Siege of Boston (April 19, 1775–March 17, 1776). In the fall of 1775, Morgan volunteered to join Colonel Benedict Arnold’s expedition against Quebec. Morgan led the advance up the Kennebec River, finally reaching the St. Lawrence River in November. He was with Arnold’s column during the American assault against Quebec on the evening of December 31 and took command when Arnold was wounded. The assault was successful at first, but Morgan was ultimately compelled to surrender to the British. He was held as a prisoner until paroled in August 1776. Even before his exchange in January 1777, Morgan had been promoted on November 12, 1776, to colonel of a new regiment, the 11th Virginia Continentals. He

joined Washington’s army in New Jersey in April 1777, taking command of the Corps of Rangers, an elite body of 500 sharpshooting riflemen. These men he effectively employed for the next four months in skirmishes against the British in New Jersey. In August, he was ordered northward to assist Major General Horatio Gates in opposing British lieutenant general John Burgoyne’s invasion of New York (the Saratoga Campaign of June 14–October 17, 1777). Reinforced by 300 men, Morgan joined Gates’s army at Bemis Heights, where he employed his men in reconnoitering British positions and sniping at British officers and privates. In the Battle of Freeman’s Farm on September 19, Morgan and his riflemen were in the thick of the fight. Following this American victory, Washington requested Morgan’s return. But at Gates’s urging, Morgan was allowed to remain with the Northern Army. In the Battle of Bemis Heights on October 7, Morgan’s men were again closely engaged. Following the British surrender at Saratoga on October 17, Morgan received high praise for his contribution. Morgan now rejoined Washington’s army at Whitemarsh and spent the winter at Valley Forge. For the remainder of 1778, Morgan’s corps performed various services. Meanwhile, Morgan constantly advocated the importance of coordinating the guerrilla activities of partisans and militia with his own command. In 1779, a year of frustration for him, Morgan’s rifle regiment was disbanded, and he was appointed colonel of the 7th Regiment. After being passed over for command of a new light infantry corps, Morgan took a furlough in July 1779 and retired to Virginia. In July 1780, Gates, who had been appointed to command the Continental Southern Army, persuaded Congress to

Musketry | 181

promote Morgan to brigadier general and then convinced Morgan to return to active service. Before Morgan arrived, Gates suffered a disastrous defeat in the Battle of Camden on August 16. On October 2, Morgan assumed command of an elite light infantry corps, and 12 days later, he was officially promoted to brigadier general. Throughout the fall of 1780, Morgan labored to make his light corps the equal of its British counterpart, Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton’s British Legion. Morgan writhed in enforced inactivity and longed for a chance to strike at “bloody Tarleton.” Morgan’s opportunity came in December 1780, when Major General Nathanael Greene replaced Gates as American commander in the South. Immediately dividing his weak Continental forces, Greene gave Morgan an independent command, ordering him to move into northwestern South Carolina, collect militia, and oppose any movement that Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis, the British commander in the South, might make in that direction. When Cornwallis learned of Greene’s dispositions, he ordered Tarleton on January 6 to march with 1,100 men and defeat Morgan. Falling back with his mixed army of Continental and militia soldiers, about 1,000 men in all, Morgan reached a position called Cowpens, South Carolina. There, on January 17, 1781, he decided to stand and fight. Positioning his militia, riflemen, Continentals, and cavalry so as to derive maximum benefit from each, Morgan won a brilliant victory over Tarleton, a classic double envelopment often called the “American Cannae.” After the battle, Morgan, pursued by Cornwallis, retreated northward. Greene now joined him with the rest of the army as they retired across North Carolina just ahead of the pursuing British. In February, debilitated by illness, Morgan went home

on leave. His physical ailments precluded further military service except for a short, uneventful stint in July. After the war, Morgan applied himself to building his personal fortune, which became substantial. In 1794, as a major general in the Virginia Militia, he helped defeat the Whiskey Rebellion. He also served one term in the U.S. House of Representatives, where he championed Federalist policies. Morgan died in Winchester, Virginia, on July 6, 1802. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Higginbotham, Don. “Daniel Morgan: Guerilla Fighter.” In George Washington’s Generals and Opponents: Their Exploits and Leadership, edited by George Athan Billias, 291–316. New York: Da Capo, 1994. Higginbotham, Don. Daniel Morgan: Revolutionary Rifleman. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1961. Nelson, Paul David. General Horatio Gates: A Biography. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1976.

Musketry Musketry is defined as the art or science of using small arms, especially in battle. The basic weapon of the American Revolutionary War was the smoothbore flintlock musket, and the principal tactic for infantry was the line of battle. The men would advance in two ranks, shoulder to shoulder, in a line that might be two or three ranks deep, with two being the most common. The attackers would move forward with fixed bayonets, knowing that they were safe from enemy musketry to about 80 yards or so. Because the musket was a very inaccurate weapon, commanders endeavored to close their men

182 | Musketry

to about 50 yards or so from an enemy force to enhance the effects of their fire. Once the two sides were in position, volley fire commenced. The first rank would fire and then stand fast to reload, while the second rank, perhaps six paces behind the first, passed through the first and then formed up and delivered its own volley. The second rank, however, might simply consist of file closers, men who would take the place of the fallen in the first rank. This process was to be repeated while withstanding the effects of enemy defensive fire until the enemy broke or a bayonet charge was ordered. Loading and firing was to be on oral command, with some 12 different commands employed from the manual of arms. Strict discipline was required, something achieved only through lengthy, repeated drills. There was little or no aiming involved. The theory behind this was that the sheer volume of fire would produce heavy enemy casualties. Rapidity of fire was everything and accuracy nothing; at such close ranges, a compact body of men would be difficult to miss in volleys ideally delivered at intervals of 15–20 seconds. Should the defenders stand firm and not bolt, this would mean that they should be able to deliver two volleys against an attacking force charging with bayonets. The British Army developed a system of firing by grand divisions, based on the tactical unit of the platoon. Each line infantry regiment or battalion of eight companies was divided into 12 platoons, each with an officer and a sergeant. The platoons were then formed into four grand divisions of 3 platoons each. Each grand division had a captain, a lieutenant, and an ensign. The platoons were positioned in line symmetrically,

with firing either by grand division or by platoon in a variety of methods but with the object of keeping the enemy line under constant fire while part of one’s own line was always prepared to fire. This system worked well in theory, but its success or failure hinged on the amount of training the men had received and on battlefield conditions. Noise drowned out commands, and the smoke obscured vision. Thus, firing was often at will—which meant as rapidly as an individual could load and fire his weapon— until a bayonet charge was ordered, he ran out of ammunition, or his musket ceased to function. These tactics could be extremely costly in terms of casualties. At the Battle of Zorndorf in 1758, during the Seven Years’ War (1756– 1763), the Russians suffered more than 50 percent casualties. Such losses were not easily replaced and help to explain why commanders sought to outmaneuver an opponent rather than engage in a bloody confrontation or broke off battle prematurely. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Moore, William. Weapons of the American Revolution. New York: Funk and Wagnalls, 1967. Neumann, George C. The History of the Weapons of the American Revolution. New York: Harper and Row, 1967. Peterson, Harold. Arms and Armor in Colonial America, 1526–1783. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole, 1956. Suasso, A. A Treatise on the British Drill and Exercise of the Company with an Introduction to the Field Exercise of the Battalion Explaining the Different Posts and Situations of Every Individual in the Battalion during the Performance of Its Movements. London: W. Clowes, 1816.

N Newburgh Conspiracy (1782–1783)

more upsetting to Washington, it never had enough revenue to pay his soldiers. After several months without pay, in December 1782, a group of officers encamped at Newburgh sent a three-man delegation, led by Major General Alexander McDougall, with a petition to Congress. The petition stated that the officers of the army had suffered greatly during seven years of war, that many were now penniless, and that they deserved their pay and pensions. The delegation further argued that if Congress deemed that the nation could not afford the half-salary pension for life, then the officers would accept a lump-sum payment when the war ended. Congress rejected the proposal. At this point in time, the interests of three factions came together. The nationalists in Congress, frustrated with the debilitating weakness of the Confederation and fearful that the decentralized government would eventually lead to chaos and disunion, wanted to create a stronger national government. Public creditors sought payment for American war bonds, and the officers wanted pensions. None of these things could be achieved unless Congress created a permanent and enforceable tax. A small group of nationalists in Congress, including Alexander Hamilton, Robert Morris, and Gouverneur Morris, then devised a scheme to encourage the officers at Newburgh to threaten some sort of mutiny to compel Congress to pass a tax bill. On March 8, 1783, the nationalists sent a messenger to Newburgh to provoke the officers into action. Although the details are

The Newburgh Conspiracy was an aborted plot orchestrated by officers of the Continental Army near the end of the American Revolutionary War. Many of the specifics of the conspiracy remain sketchy, but it is clear that the officers involved were motivated by the fear that the Confederation Congress would renege on its 1780 promise to provide officer veterans with a postwar pension of half their military pay, a common practice in Europe at the time. If not for the decisive action of General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, this affair might have been the first coup attempt by the U.S. Army in American history, which would have damaged the civilian-military relationship in the early years of the U.S. government. After the British defeat at Yorktown in October 1781, American and British officials and diplomats engaged in prolonged negotiations in Paris to produce a treaty that would officially end the war. Pending the formal conclusion of a treaty, Washington camped with the bulk of the Continental Army at Newburgh, New York. He had been continuously frustrated with the Confederation Congress, which had shown itself too weak to administer the basic functions of government and effectively conduct the war. Under the feeble Articles of Confederation, the 13 states retained most of their autonomy. The national government had no power to tax and therefore never had sufficient revenue to pay its debts. Even 183

184 | North, Frederick, 2nd Earl of Guilford

not entirely clear, it appears that a group of officers loyal to Major General Horatio Gates supported the idea of either refusing to lay down their arms until they got paid or actually launching a coup d’état against Congress. One of these officers wrote a rousing anonymous letter, known as the Newburgh Address, that spread throughout the encampment. These officers also called for a meeting on March 9 to discuss Congress’s rejection of their petition. As soon as General George Washington heard of these events, he issued an order stating that, as commander, only he could authorize such a meeting. He scheduled a meeting for the officers on March 12, giving the men time to cool down and reflect on their actions. The officers were shocked when Washington strode into the meeting and asked Gates whether he could speak. In his own Newburgh Address, Washington proceeded to talk about his loyalty and love for his troops and how a mutiny would destroy everything the revolution had come to represent. Then Washington paused and dramatically took out a pair of reading glasses, a relatively rare device at the time, and remarked, “Gentlemen, you will permit me to put on my spectacles, for I have grown not only grey, but almost blind, in the service of my country.” With these words Washington removed the tensions of the last week, and several officers wept openly. The conspiracy was over. Washington’s handling of the crisis was nothing short of brilliant, and after he had spoken, the officers unanimously drafted a proclamation in which they expressed “unshaken confidence” in Congress and disavowed the Newburgh Address. Congress eventually voted to compensate the officers with full pay over a span of five years, and the enlisted men were to receive full pay for six months. The troops were

simply furloughed. Some soldiers proceeded to Philadelphia to demonstrate, but for the vast majority, the desire for home proved stronger than their back pay. Congress promised to send the pay but never did. One practical effect of the failure of the Newburgh Conspiracy, however, was to solidify the supremacy of the civilian government over the military. E. Michael Young

Further Reading Ellis, Richard. His Excellency: George Washington. New York: Knopf, 2005. Flexner, James Thomas. Washington: The Indispensable Man. Boston: Little, Brown, 1974. Kohn, Richard H. “The Inside History of the Newburgh Conspiracy: America and the Coup d’État.” William and Mary Quarterly 27 (1970): 187–220. Martin, James Kirby, and Mark E. Lender. A Respectable Army: The Military Origins of the Republic, 1763–1789. Wheeling, IL: Harlan Davidson, 1982. Nelson, Paul David. “Horatio Gates at Newburgh, 1783: A Misunderstood Role.” William and Mary Quarterly 29 (1972): 143–158. Skeen, Edward, and Richard K. Kohn. “The Newburgh Conspiracy Reconsidered.” William and Mary Quarterly 31 (1974): 273–298.

North, Frederick, 2nd Earl of Guilford(1732–1792) Frederick North, 2nd Earl of Guilford, was a British statesman and prime minister (1770–1782). He was born to British nobility in London on April 13, 1732. He was named after his godfather, Prince Frederick, who was the father of King George III. North studied at Eton College from 1742 to



1748, and in 1750, he was awarded a master of arts degree from Oxford University. He spent the next three years on the European mainland receiving additional education at the University of Leipzig. North was elected to the House of Commons in 1754 representing Banbury, a borough northwest of London. He would continue as a member of Parliament for the next 38 years. Showing keen ability in procedure and debate, he quickly earned the respect of his colleagues. He was a moderate conservative, generally more at home with the Tory faction than the Whig faction. In 1759, North was appointed to the Treasury Board, a post he retained until 1765. During 1763, he was selected to speak for the government in opposing and eventually ousting from Parliament the radical John Wilkes. In 1766, William Pitt the Elder, 1st Earl of Chatham, assigned North as joint paymaster of British forces. Thereby, North also became a member of the king’s Privy Council. In 1767, North succeeded Charles Townshend as chancellor of the exchequer and during 1768 became leader of the House of Commons as well. Following Pitt’s retirement due to poor health, North continued in his services under Prime Minister Augustus Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Grafton, who resigned on January 28, 1770, following a brief tenure. That same day, January 28, Lord North accepted appointment as the sixth prime minister to serve George III. The king very much trusted and favored North, and the two men thought very much alike. On multiple occasions during the next 12 years, North tried to resign as prime minister, but the king would not hear of it. Consequently, the names of both men would be lastingly linked to the loss of Britain’s North American colonies.

North, Frederick, 2nd Earl of Guilford | 185

North’s early administration showed much promise. His actions helped to avoid a major war during the Falklands Crisis of 1770, and strong demonstrations of British naval preparedness quickly discouraged France from attack. North’s long experience in national finance brought additional success. He was able to increase revenue through the use of a lottery, reducing imperial debts that had mounted during the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763). Also in 1770, North agreed to the repeal of all but one tax (that on tea) of the much-maligned 1767 Townshend Acts. The repeal did seem to reduce American discontent, as radicalism in the colonies remained somewhat subdued during the next several years. Following these achievements, however, North stumbled into a series of tragic miscalculations. In May 1773, he secured passage of the Tea Act, a law that aimed to assist the ailing British East India Company by reducing royal duties and allowing direct shipments of tea overseas. Now, highquality East India tea would be cheaper for American consumers than low-quality smuggled tea. Even so, colonists stridently opposed the law, determined to reject any imperial taxation. In the Boston Tea Party of December 16, 1773, Patriots destroyed British tea. Upon Lord North’s lead, in March 1774, Parliament punished Massachusetts through a series of Coercive Acts, closing the Port of Boston and placing the colony under de facto martial law. Further frustrated by the June 1774 Quebec Act, many Americans now came to accept the radical suspicion that the British government was irreparably corrupt. As tensions mounted, early in 1775, North suggested to Parliament that imperial taxes might be dropped altogether, provided that the Americans pay colonial officials. This motion was insufficient,

186 | North, Frederick, 2nd Earl of Guilford

however, and conflict began that April in Massachusetts. After the Battle of Bunker Hill on June 17, North had no choice but to acknowledge that the colonies were in a state of rebellion. North possessed no military expertise, so he deferred military strategy to Lord George Germain, the secretary of state for the American Department. Germain had served in the British military and was far more hawkish than North. In fact, Germain worked to undermine any hopes the prime minister yet entertained of a peaceful reconciliation with the colonies. The ministry celebrated British victories at New York in 1776 and Philadelphia in 1777, but the Americans refused to give up the fight. Meanwhile, North’s impressive gains against the national debt were all but destroyed, as war costs mounted quickly. The British suffered a major setback at Saratoga on October 17, 1777, when Lieutenant General John Burgoyne was forced to surrender his army. Now despondent, North authorized a special peace mission (the Carlisle Commission), which would offer the Americans nearly everything they wanted, short of independence. It was too late. On February 6, 1778, France formally joined in a military alliance with the United States. War between Britain and France followed, and in June 1779, Spain joined the fight against Britain. In December 1780, the British felt obliged to declare war against the Dutch Republic. British forces were now committed and engaged in a global conflict. In consequence, North supported the Papist Act of 1778, hoping to induce greater religious tolerance and the recruitment of Catholic soldiers and sailors. Unfortunately, the act was ill received, and in June 1780, London was wracked by a week of anti-Catholic rioting

in which nearly 300 civilians were killed by British soldiers. Still, the North government persevered. France and Spain failed to carry off their planned invasion of the British Isles, and in 1780, the British celebrated victories over the Americans at Charles Town (Charleston) and Camden, South Carolina (May 12 and August 16, respectively). For a time thereafter, the prime minister enjoyed strong support once again in the House of Commons. Then, on October 19, 1781, the British southern strategy fell apart at Yorktown, Virginia. Hearing the news of Cornwallis’s surrender, North exclaimed in agony, “Oh God, it’s all over!” Stubbornly, the king refused to accept North’s latest attempt to resign or to acknowledge American independence. Parliament had seen enough, however. On February 27, 1782, it recorded its first motion of no confidence against an imperial administration. Lord North finally resigned, effective on March 22, 1782. For a time, there was talk that North should be put on trial for supposed misconduct during the war. However, nothing came of this. British military fortunes improved significantly during 1782, with victories at Gibraltar and Jamaica, and North’s government was credited with having prepared the way for those successes. During 1783, North made a brief comeback as home secretary through liaison with radical Whig leader Charles James Fox, then the foreign secretary. That same year, the British formally admitted defeat and recognized American independence. North continued service in the House of Commons until 1790, by which time he was almost totally blind. His father died that



year, and North inherited a seat in the House of Lords. Lord Frederick North died in London on August 5, 1792. Jeffrey W. Dennis

Further Reading O’Shaughnessy, Andrew Jackson. The Men Who Lost America: British Leadership, the American Revolution, and the Fate of the

North, Frederick, 2nd Earl of Guilford | 187 Empire. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2013. Thomas, Peter D. G. Lord North. New York: St. Martin’s, 1976. Valentine, Alan. Lord North. 2 vols. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1967. Whiteley, Peter. Lord North: The Prime Minister Who Lost America. Camden, UK: Bloomsbury Academic, 2003.

P Paine, Thomas(1737–1809)

and had a tremendous impact on American public opinion. In July 1776, Paine served in the Continental Army as a volunteer aide-de-camp to Brigadier General Nathanael Greene, but Paine’s goal was to write, not fight. He left the army in December 1776. During the war, he published a series of widely read pamphlets that bolstered American revolutionary morale. For example, in December 1776, after the dismal performance of the American forces in the New York–New Jersey campaign, Paine’s first American Crisis pamphlet began with the now famous line “These are the times that try men’s souls.” The entire pamphlet was read aloud to General George Washington’s troops on December 23 as they girded themselves for the fight at Trenton, New Jersey, on December 26. Undoubtedly in appreciation of Paine’s writing efforts and need to earn a living, he was appointed by the Second Continental Congress as secretary of the Foreign Affairs Committee in April 1777. He fulfilled his duties properly for two years, but in 1779, he was forced to resign after indiscreetly mentioning in a newspaper article information about secret French aid only known to him because of his official position. In December 1779, he secured a position as clerk of the Pennsylvania Assembly. Paine endeavored to persuade wealthy Americans to contribute greater sums of money to help prosecute the war and keep debt levels from ballooning. In early 1781, he accompanied Continental Army lieutenant colonel John Laurens to Paris as an unpaid, unofficial

As a writer, pamphleteer, political theorist, and Patriot propagandist, perhaps no other individual did more to inspire Americans to obtain their independence from Great Britain and to endeavor to spread the principles of the American Revolution to Europe than Thomas Paine. He was born on January 29, 1737, in Thetford, England. After working in a variety of jobs with only debt to show for his efforts, he decided to immigrate to North America. Aided by a letter of introduction from Benjamin Franklin, Paine arrived in Pennsylvania in November 1774, where he managed to earn a living in Philadelphia as the editor of the Pennsylvania Magazine and as a journalist. Paine closely followed the events that led up to the American Revolution. At first, he believed that the colonies should avoid armed rebellion, but once actual fighting began in April 1775, he became convinced that only complete independence would suffice. In January 1776, he published his famous 47-page pamphlet Common Sense, explaining his reasoning in bold, direct language. Paine advocated a declaration of independence to secure European aid and to unite the 13 colonies. The new unspoiled, democratic America had to break its ties with England to evolve in its own unique way, he argued. Once independence had been achieved, America could establish a centralized democratic-republican form of government that would serve as a model and beacon to the rest of the world. Common Sense was phenomenally successful 189

190 | Paine, Thomas

adviser while Laurens lobbied the French government for more war funding. Once the revolution was won in 1783, Paine, who had earned few profits from his pamphlets, was awarded a confiscated Loyalist farm in New Rochelle by the State of New York and a £500 honorarium by the State of Pennsylvania. He spent much time designing an iron bridge to span large rivers and other bodies of water, the plans for which he hoped to sell in Europe. Paine lived in relative comfort on his farm until traveling to Europe in 1787 to seek endorsements and funding for his new bridge design. Living in London in the early years of the French Revolution, which began in 1789, Paine wrote The Rights of Man (1791–1792). These volumes defended the actions of the revolutionary French government, attacked Britain’s hostility to the French Revolution and support of a monarchical form of government, and argued that all people had natural civil rights. The British government issued a warrant for his arrest, and Paine fled to France in 1792, where he was initially hailed as a hero and even elected to the National Assembly, despite the fact that he spoke little French and was not a French citizen. He soon became embroiled in the political turmoil there and was imprisoned by the Jacobins from December 1793 until

American intervention finally secured his release in November 1794. Financially destitute and in poor health, Paine returned to America in 1802, where he spent the last seven years of his life on his farm in New Rochelle, living in penury. Although hailed by President Thomas Jefferson and a number of DemocraticRepublicans, Paine was also vilified for having published a letter while imprisoned in France that was sharply critical of President George Washington. Other detractors took issue with Paine’s Age of Reason, published in 1794 and 1795, which was sharply critical of Christianity and organized religion. Paine died on June 8, 1809, in New Rochelle, New York. Steven G. O’Brien

Further Reading Aldridge, A. Owen. Man of Reason: The Life of Thomas Paine. New York: Lippincott, 1959. Aldridge, A. Owen. Thomas Paine’s American Ideology. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1984. Foner, Eric. Tom Paine and Revolutionary America. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. Powell, David. Tom Paine: The Greatest Exile. London: Croom Helm, 1985.

Q Quartering Act(June 2, 1774)

between Britain and America, were seen by the colonists as violations of their rights as Englishmen. In Americans’ minds, the first Quartering Act was associated with the detested Stamp Act, which was passed during the same session of Parliament. They considered both measures to be utterly unconstitutional. The colonists were also extremely suspicious of what they saw as standing armies in peacetime, believing that professional military forces were a threat to their liberties. After the French and Indian War (1754–1763), although Americans had not asked for nor wanted British troops to be permanently stationed in North America, the government in London had posted 17 regiments on the far frontiers. Adding insult to injury, Parliament then began levying taxes on Americans, without their consent, to help pay for these troops. By 1774, the colonists’ worst fears seemed have been confirmed, for in 1770, Gage had shifted four British regiments eastward to Boston and was now using these soldiers to enforce the Coercive Acts. Two years after that, when Thomas Jefferson was listing the reasons for America’s secession from the British Empire in the Declaration of Independence, he specifi­ cally mentioned Parliament’s “quartering large bodies of armed troops among the populace” as an important cause. Paul David Nelson

The Quartering Act of 1774 was Parliamentary legislation that amended the Quartering Act of May 3, 1765. The first Quartering Act, enacted shortly after the Stamp Act, required local civil authorities in America to provide barracks and supplies for British troops stationed in North America. It also directed the quartering of troops in taverns, inns, alehouses, and even uninhabited houses and barns where barracks were not available. The act compelled local civil authorities to provide supplies for the quartered troops without reimbursement from the British government. The second Quartering Act, passed on June 2, 1774, in reaction to the Boston Tea Party (December 16, 1773), was accompanied by three other bills: the Boston Port Act, the Massachusetts Government Act, and the Administration of Justice Act. These four measures were known collectively as the Coercive Acts. They were intended to strengthen the hand of Governor (and Lieutenant General) Thomas Gage in dealing with radicalism in Massachusetts. The new Quartering Act increased Gage’s power to garrison troops in public buildings when he deemed it helpful in suppressing popular resistance to British authority. More appalling for Americans, it also authorized him to seize unoccupied dwellings and privately owned commercial buildings for the same purpose. It was to expire on March 24, 1776. The two Quartering Acts, passed during a decade of growing political tensions

Further Reading Ammerman, David. In the Common Cause: American Response to the Coercive Acts of 191

192 | Quebec, Siege and Battle of 1774. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1974. Gerlach, Don R. “A Note on the Quartering Act of 1774.” New England Quarterly 39 (1966): 80–88. Shy, John. Toward Lexington: The Role of the British Army in the Coming of the American Revolution. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1965.

Quebec, Siege and Battle of (December 5, 1775–May 6, 1776) On November 14, 1775, Colonel Benedict Arnold arrived at Quebec, Canada, with some 600–675 men, all that remained of the 1,051 who had set out from Massachusetts on September 13. Arnold then attempted, without success, to bluff Quebec’s 1,200man garrison, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Allan MacLean, into surrender. Arnold concluded that it would take 2,000 men and cannon to force the British into surrendering. Learning that MacLean planned a sortie against him, Arnold decided on November 19 to withdraw to Pointe-aux-Trembles and there await the arrival of the second prong of the American Canadian invasion force under Continental Army brigadier general Richard Montgomery to come up from Montreal. Meanwhile, the governor of Quebec, Major General Sir Guy Carleton, having escaped from Montreal, arrived at Quebec and assumed command there. On December 2, Montgomery arrived at Quebec from Montreal with 600 men, four cannon and six mortars, and captured British supplies and winter clothing. Together, he and Arnold had some 1,250 men to face an equal number of Canadian defenders; however, the defenders were in a fortified city with cannon.

On December 5, Continental Army forces were again on the Plains of Abraham before the city and initiated a siege. Carleton burned a letter from Montgomery demanding his surrender. With his militia thought to be unreliable, Carleton wisely refused to engage the Americans in battle outside the city. On December 10, the Americans commenced a bombardment, but the small number of artillery pieces and their small size meant that it had scant effect. At the same time, the frozen ground prevented the Americans from digging trenches to close on the city in that manner. With only their small force and no siege equipment, Montgomery and Arnold could not maintain a complete siege, nor could they remain there indefinitely. Supplies were dwindling fast, and the enlistments for Arnold’s troops were to expire at the end of the year with no hope that they would be renewed. Arnold and Montgomery then decided that their only hope of taking the city was an assault masked by a snowstorm. A storm arrived on December 27 but abated, and Montgomery called off the attack. Another storm arrived on the night of December 30–31, and early on December 31, Montgomery led 500 men in an approach from the south. Arriving at Près de Ville by 4:00 a.m., he led his men in person from the front against a fortified British position. Montgomery and several dozen of his men were killed by musket fire and grapeshot from two 3-pounder cannon in a blockhouse. Montgomery’s successor, Colonel Donald Campbell, ordered a precipitous retreat. Meanwhile, Arnold had approached the city from the north, arriving at Saint Roch with 700 men. He enjoyed more success, but in the ensuing fighting, he was wounded in the knee and had to be evacuated. Major Daniel Morgan succeeded to the command and was able to penetrate the city. However,



with Montgomery’s southern force having withdrawn, Carleton was able to concentrate his men against the northern threat and blockade Morgan from further penetration. The American force was surrounded, cut into small detachments, and by 9:00 a.m. was forced to surrender. In the battle, the American losses were 30 killed, 42 wounded, and 425 taken prisoner. British Army and Canadian militia forces suffered 5 dead and 13 wounded. Arnold then collected the American survivors and reestablished a loose siege. Despite being outnumbered three to one, he managed to maintain a tenuous hold during the winter, assisted by some French-speaking Canadians sympathetic to the American cause. In early April 1776, Major General David Wooster, who had been in charge of the American occupation of Montreal, arrived at Quebec and replaced Arnold in command. On May 1, Wooster was in turn replaced by Major General John Thomas. The American effort was for naught. On May 6, 1776, the British supply ship Surprise arrived at Quebec, effectively putting an end to the American siege. The Americans, beset with desertions and ravaged by smallpox (which would subsequently claim Thomas), were already planning to withdraw. Shortly thereafter, utilizing the freshly arrived British forces, Carleton

Quebec, Siege and Battle of | 193

mounted a sortie and turned the American withdrawal into a rout. A number of the French-speaking Canadians who had aided the Americans withdrew toward Montreal with them. Those who remained faced Carleton’s retribution. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Bird, Harrison. Attack on Quebec: The American Invasion of Canada, 1775. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968. Gabriel, Michael P. Major General Richard Montgomery: The Making of an American Hero. Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2002. Lanctôt, Gustave. Canada and the American Revolution 1774–1783. Translated by Margaret M. Cameron. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1967. Morrissey, Brendan. Quebec 1775: The American Invasion of Canada. Translated by Adam Hook. New York: Osprey, 2003. Shelton, Hal T. General Richard Montgomery and the American Revolution: From Redcoat to Rebel. New York: New York University Press, 1984. Smith, Justin H. Our Struggle for the Fourteenth Colony. Vol. 1. New York: Putnam, 1907. Stanley, George Francis Gillman. Canada Invaded, 1775–1776. Toronto: Hakkert, 1973.

R Rhode Island Campaign and Battle of Rhode Island (August 8–30, 1778)

assembled several thousand men as well as a sufficient number of boats to carry out three simultaneous landings that he hoped would force the British to disperse their resources, but continued delays left only a few days before the expiration of the enlistments of most of his men. A final effort to carry it off on October 25 had to be aborted because of bad weather. The conclusion of an alliance between the United States and France in early 1778 and the arrival of a French fleet of 12 ships of the line under Vice Admiral Jean Baptiste Charles Henri Hector, comte d’Estaing, transporting 4,000 French soldiers, provided the impetus for another attempt in what was to be the first joint attack by French and American land forces of the war. On July 22, 1778, d’Estaing and General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, conferred and agreed on Newport as the objective. Washington then informed Continental Army major general John Sullivan, who would have command of the American land forces. Sullivan called out 5,000 New England militiamen, while Washington supplied two veteran brigades under Brigadier Generals James Varnum and John Glover. These additions gave Sullivan a total of some 10,000 men. Washington assigned Major General Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, and Major General Nathanael Greene to serve under Sullivan. Rhode Island was Greene’s home state, and Washington could not resist the entreaties of his capable quartermaster general for this combat posting. Lafayette had to be involved because of the

On December 7, 1776, a large British expeditionary force arrived at Narragansett Bay in transports and landed on Aquidneck Island (commonly called Rhode Island, not be confused with the state of Rhode Island), quickly securing control of Newport and bottling up a number of American privateers up the bay at Providence. Several days later, the British occupied Conanicut, the second-largest island in the bay. Control of the bay was of great strategic advantage, for Newport possessed one of the finest harbors in North America and provided the British with an excellent anchorage, easily accessible to their largest warships, as well as a base from which they could send out smaller warships to operate against the New England coast. Aquidneck Island is long and narrow. It is closest to the mainland at its northern tip but is also reasonably close to the mainland along its eastern shore, the east passage into Narragansett Bay. Newport lies on the southwestern part of Aquidneck, on the middle passage into the bay. Across the middle passage and flanking Aquidneck is Conanicut, with the third (west) passage into the bay to its west. Continental Army major general Benedict Arnold wanted to retake the island from the British soon after its capture, but nothing came of this. It fell to Major General Joseph Spencer to plan and then carry out such an operation. In October 1777, Spencer 195

196 | Rhode Island Campaign and Battle of Rhode Island

French connection. Detached from Washington’s main army at Westchester County, New York, the regulars did not arrive in Providence until the first week in August. As developed, the plan called for the Americans to cross over from the mainland to Aquidneck Island at its northern end and then proceed southward to Newport. Meanwhile, d’Estaing would land the French troops on Conanicut Island, using it as a staging point from which troops would be ferried across the middle passage to Aquidneck, just north of Newport, where they would then join American troops before Newport in a simultaneous attack. At the same time, the French warships would blockade Newport from the sea. D’Estaing arrived near Newport on July 29. He was impatient to begin operations, for he wanted to get his troops on land and secure fresh food and water. On July 30, he sent the capable Rear Admiral Pierre André de Suffren with two small French ships of the line up the west channel to anchor near the southern end of Conanicut Island. At the same time, two French frigates and a corvette entered easterly Sakonnet channel, causing the British to burn the sloop Kingfisher (16 guns) and several galleys. British ground force commander Major General Sir Robert Pigot then ordered the guns spiked and troop detachments withdrawn from Conanicut Island and concentrated around Newport. On August 5, Suffren’s two ships of the line weighed anchor and proceeded up the west channel and into the bay, anchoring in the main channel north of Conanicut Island. At the same time, two other French ships of the line of d’Estaing’s fleet assumed Suffren’s former position. With all escape routes now blocked, the commander of British naval forces at Newport, Captain John Brisbane, scuttled those ships unable to enter the

inner harbor: the 32-gun frigates Flora, Juno, Lark, and Orpheus as well as the sloop Falcon (16 guns). Two of the ships were sunk between Goat Island and Rhode Island to prevent the French ships from accessing that route, and Brisbane also ordered five transports sunk north of Goat Island to protect the inner harbor from that direction. The French now had control of the waters around Aquidneck Island. The preliminaries cost the British five frigates, two sloops, and several galleys, but the guns and ammunition from these vessels were offloaded and added to the land defenses. Their crews, totaling more than 1,000 men, manned artillery in the British fortifications. Lafayette arrived on August 4 and conferred with d’Estaing. All seemed in readiness. Sullivan agreed to provide Lafayette 1,000 men for a combined French and American assault under Lafayette’s command. D’Estaing was eager for the ground campaign to commence, for surely the commander of British naval forces in North American waters, Vice Admiral Lord Richard Howe, would have to act soon to try to relieve the French naval pressure at Newport. Sullivan, however, needed more time to organize his forces. The two commanders agreed that they would move in concert on August 9–10. On August 8, d’Estaing’s remaining eight ships of the line arrived and ran past the British batteries on Aquidneck Island and Goat Island, shelling Newport as they proceeded, then they anchored above Goat Island, between it and Conanicut Island. The other four previously detached smallest ships of the line in d’Estaing’s squadron then joined the main body, and d’Estaing landed some of his 4,000 ground troops on Conanicut Island, the men coming ashore for the first time in four months. The ground attack was now scheduled for August 10.



Rhode Island Campaign and Battle of Rhode Island | 197

Meanwhile, on August 7, Sullivan had departed Providence with his 10,000 men and marched to Tiverton, where his men would be ferried across to the northern tip of Aquidneck Island. They arrived at Tiverton on August 8. Pigot now withdrew his forces on Aquidneck southward toward Newport into the prepared defenses on the edge of the town. He hoped to force the attackers into a siege to purchase time for the arrival of a British relief force. Informed of the British move, Sullivan crossed his men to Aquidneck Island on August 9, a day ahead of schedule, without informing d’Estaing beforehand and began moving south against Newport, expecting the French ground forces to land and join him. Allied cooperation now began to fall apart. D’Estaing was upset that Sullivan had taken precedence in moving a day early without telling him, but this issue was swept aside with the arrival of Howe’s fleet off Point Judith at the western end of Narragansett Bay, also on August 9. Reinforced to 13 ships of the line, Howe had sailed north from New York to engage d’Estaing’s 12 ships of the line. The French nevertheless had a considerable advantage, for d’Estaing’s ships were larger and had a greater weight of broadside. D’Estaing had 1 ship of the line of 90 guns, 1 of 80 guns, 6 of 74 guns, 3 of 64 guns, and 1 of 50 guns as well as several smaller ships. Howe had 1 ship of the line of 74 guns, 7 of 64 guns, and 5 of 50 guns as well as several smaller ships. D’Estaing now withdrew his land forces and on August 10 sailed out to engage the British, despite pleas from Sullivan. D’Estaing believed that he could not allow his ships to be trapped at Newport, with the French West Indies then open to British attack. In any case, Howe would have to be driven off.

Inconclusive maneuvering followed. Howe had finally secured the weather gauge, with the plan to send fireships against the French, and a major battle appeared imminent. But then a severe storm, presumed to be a hurricane, arrived. During August 12–13, it widely scattered and damaged both fleets, the French ships more severely. Howe sailed for New York to effect repairs. Sullivan was determined to press forward, alone if need be. On August 11, he had put his army in motion southward, but then the great storm struck. The Americans had no cover, and the rain ruined their cartridges, reducing the soldiers to fighting with bayonets. It took several days to bring up fresh ammunition, but on August 15, the Americans began moving toward the British defenses. Greene and Varnum moved toward Newport along the West Road while Lafayette and Glover proceeded on the East Road. That afternoon, the American siege of Newport commenced. The Americans first entrenched and then began digging parallels toward the British lines. By August 19, American artillery was within range of the British lines, and both sides opened a cannonade against the other, but without serious effect. On August 20, the French ships began to return to Newport following their scattering in the storm, and it appeared as if the British fate was now sealed. However, the next day, d’Estaing, his flagship among the most heavily damaged French warships, informed an astonished Sullivan that he would be sailing to Boston to refit. D’Estaing rejected appeals from Sullivan that he remain for even a few days, arguing that his ships would be vulnerable should the British reappear in strength. Greene met with d’Estaing and pointed out to the Frenchman that the project had

198 | Rhode Island Campaign and Battle of Rhode Island

been undertaken as a joint operation and that the French ships could be repaired at Providence. D’Estaing had Greene write out his arguments and took these to his captains, but the latter then voted to proceed to Boston, with its presumed superior facili­ ties. D’Estaing upheld their decision, which was in accordance with his orders to repair to Boston if the ships suffered major damage in American waters. D’Estaing had also learned that Vice Admiral John Byron had arrived with Royal Navy reinforcements for Howe. D’Estaing’s orders specified that in the event of a powerful British naval combination against him, he was to sail to the West Indies and protect the important French possessions there. D’Estaing departed for Boston on August 22. The Americans might still have won a victory, but with d’Estaing’s departure, most of the militiamen in Sullivan’s army lost heart and also left during the next several days, reducing American armed strength to 7,000 men against 6,000 British. With the British entrenchments stronger than his own, Sullivan wisely decided against an assault. He remained in place for several days, hoping to bluff Pigot, but on August 24, Sullivan learned from Washington that reinforcements were on their way to Pigot. With his strength now reduced to only 5,000 men, Sullivan decided that he had no choice but to withdraw to the northern tip of Aquidneck and there await d’Estaing’s return. Lafayette made a quick trip to Boston to try to persuade d’Estaing to return and then returned himself, but not in time for the subsequent fighting. The American withdrawal occurred during the night of August 28–29. Informed of the American move, Pigot sortied, hoping to turn the tables on the entrenched Americans. In what is known as the Battle of Rhode Island, on August 29, Greene

commanded the American left and Sullivan the right and center. In the battle, some 5,000 Americans turned back repeated assaults by 3,000 attacking British and Hessian troops, who were supported by the 20-gun sloops Sphynx and Vigilant and two smaller vessels. The Americans, including the militiamen who remained, fought well. With his men having gone without food or rest for 36 hours, Sullivan was unable to counterattack. American losses in the Battle of Rhode Island were reported as 30 killed, 137 wounded, and 44 missing. British losses were given as 38 killed, 210 wounded, and 12 missing. Both sides retained their positions the next day, and Pigot called up reinforcements from Newport. However, Sullivan withdrew his men from the island that night. It was a wise decision, for 5,000 British reinforcements arrived the next day under British commander in North America lieutenant general Sir Henry Clinton and Major General Charles Grey. Sullivan was furious at what he regarded as d’Estaing’s betrayal, and his all too public remarks against d’Estaing threatened to create a breach in the alliance. Washington and Greene immediately sought to repair any damage, and d’Estaing accepted in good grace their apologies for Sullivan’s intemperate remarks, although Sullivan never apologized for what he regarded as a French action tantamount to treason. His ships repaired, d’Estaing sailed from Boston for Martinique on November 4, taking with him his 4,000 troops. The weather, poor coordination, circumstances of geography, and plain bad luck had all played a role in the allied failure. Although both the Americans and French were frustrated by the outcome of the campaign, it did no lasting damage to the alliance. Spencer C. Tucker



Rhode Island Campaign and Battle of Rhode Island | 199

Further Reading Clowes, William Laird. The Royal Navy: A History from the Earliest Times to 1900. Vol. 3. 1898. Reprint, London: Chatham, 1996. Dearden, Paul F. The Rhode Island Campaign of 1778: Inauspicious Dawn of Alliance. Providence: Rhode Island Bicentennial Foundation, 1980.

Dull, John R. The French Navy and the American Revolution: A Study of Arms and Diplomacy, 1774–1787. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1975. Gruber, Ira. The Howe Brothers and the American Revolution. New York: Atheneum, 1972. Stinchcomb, William C. The American Revolution and the French Alliance. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1969.

S Saratoga Campaign (June 14–October 17, 1777)

of logistical considerations, and second, it rested on the simultaneous execution of its elements, which was always a difficult task. It was also fatally flawed in that while he was approving Burgoyne’s plan, Germain also approved an entirely different plan submitted by General Sir William Howe, the British Army commander in North America, at New York. Howe proposed to move south against Philadelphia. He believed that Continental Army commander general George Washington would have to commit the bulk of his army to defend the Patriot capital and that the rebel army might thus be destroyed and the war won. After capturing Philadelphia, Howe would then be in position to send troops up the Hudson to Albany and cut off New England. Germain made no real effort to reconcile these two plans, nor did he order the two commanders to cooperate. He simply assumed that Howe would move quickly and therefore be in a position to support Burgoyne. In April 1777, in approving his plan, Germain wrote to Howe that “it will be executed in time for you to co-operate with the army ordered to proceed from Canada and put itself under your command.” Neither Howe nor Burgoyne made any effort to coordinate with the other, although Howe did inform General Carleton, the British commander in Canada, of his intentions. Howe also pledged to position a corps in the lower Hudson River area under Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton to maintain communications through the Highlands, which might then “act in favor of the northern army.” Although

The Saratoga campaign was a British invasion from Canada that culminated in two battles in the vicinity of Saratoga, New York. It marked a turning point in the American Revolutionary War. The Saratoga campaign originated with British lieutenant general John Burgoyne. Then a major general, returning to England from North America in February 1777, Burgoyne presented to King George III and Lord George Germain, the secretary of state for the American Department, a plan to split off New England from the other colonies and thereby end the rebellion. Such an effort had been attempted before, in the fall of 1776, by Lieutenant General Sir Guy Carleton from Canada in his Lake Champlain campaign. But it had been late to begin, and he had ended it because of the approach of winter. Burgoyne envisioned a three-pronged effort. The major thrust would consist of a drive south from Canada down the Lake Champlain–Hudson Valley corridor. At the same time, a secondary effort designed as a diversion to draw off Patriot militia forces and rally Native Americans to the British would push eastward from Lake Erie up the Mohawk Valley, capture Fort Stanwix, and then join the main body at Albany, where the two combined forces would meet the third prong, a major British effort up the Hudson River from New York City. There were two principal problems with Burgoyne’s plan. First, it took little account 201

202 | Saratoga Campaign

Burgoyne saw this communication, it did not influence his planning. Burgoyne and the main British force assembled at St. Johns, south of Montreal. There, on June 13, Burgoyne and Carleton reviewed the invasion force, which set out the next day. It numbered about 8,500 men with 130 guns and mortars. Some 2,000 civilians, including a large number of women and children, accompanied the army. Later, some 500 Indians joined them. Early on, transportation proved to be a major problem. Carts to move supplies, ammunition, and baggage were in short supply, and many of those available were made of green wood; their civilian drivers were prone to desert if the going got difficult. Brigadier General Simon Fraser led the advance force, and Major General William Phillips commanded the British right. Major General Friedrich Adolf Riedesel of Brunswick had charge of the left, which was composed of German auxiliaries, many of whom were ill-equipped for wilderness warfare. At first, all went well. British ships moved south on Lake Champlain, taking undefended Crown Point on June 30 and then moving against Fort Ticonderoga. Major General Arthur St. Clair commanded the Continental Army garrison at Fort Ticonderoga and was under orders from Major General Philip Schuyler, the commander of the Northern Department, to hold out as long as possible before withdrawing. St. Clair, however, knew little of Burgoyne’s strength or dispositions, thanks to effective screening by Burgoyne’s Indians. Skirmishing at Ticonderoga commenced on July 2. Poor defensive dispositions allowed the British to position artillery on the high ground known as Sugar Loaf (now Mount Defiance) and fire into the fort.

St. Clair withdrew his men on the night of July 5, and the next day, the British occupied Ticonderoga and the defensive works of Mount Independence on the Vermont side of the lake. The British pursued and engaged the retreating Americans in three battles: Hubbardton and Skenesborough, both on July 7, and Fort Anne (July 8). After grueling marches, St. Clair and the bulk of the Americans reached Fort Edward, on the Hudson, on July 12. Although the early fighting had cost the Americans about half again as many casualties as those of the British, it also amply demonstrated American determination and fighting ability. As a result of the early campaigning, Burgoyne now had 1,500 fewer men. He had lost 200 in battle and had also been forced to leave behind 400 men to garrison Crown Point and another 900 at Ticonderoga. On July 10, at Skenesborough, Burgoyne ordered the bulk of the army to proceed overland by a rough track from Skenesborough via Fort Anne to Fort Edward. The heavy artillery would move by ship down Lake George to Fort Edward. Riedesel meanwhile would proceed toward Castleton in a movement toward the Connecticut River. Learning of the fall of Ticonderoga, General Schuyler rode from his headquarters at Albany to Fort Edward, which was held by some 700 regulars and 1,400 militiamen. In any case, the British would have had to improve the road, but Schuyler was determined to impose as much delay on them as possible. He soon had his men at work cutting down trees and collapsing bridges. Schuyler also adopted a scorched-earth policy of burning crops and provisions, forcing Burgoyne to use up his supplies and imposing an even greater strain on the British general’s already inadequate logistics system.



Burgoyne’s men left Skenesborough on July 24. Five days later, they arrived at Fort Edward to find it abandoned. The Americans had withdrawn to Stillwater. Meanwhile, Burgoyne’s diversionary effort from western New York had encountered difficulty. Lieutenant Colonel Barrimore “Barry” St. Leger, given the local rank of brigadier general, led the secondary effort from Lachine on June 23. St. Leger had some 875 British, Loyalist, and Hessian troops assisted by 800–1,000 Iroquois Indians under Joseph Brant. This force struck from Oswego into the Mohawk Valley, but the advance halted at Fort Stanwix (Fort Schuyler, present-day Rome, New York), which was commanded by Colonel Peter Gansevoort. Unknown to St. Leger, Fort Stanwix had been considerably strengthened. There, the Patriots withstood a siege that began on August 2. St. Leger’s men

Saratoga Campaign | 203

ambushed and destroyed a Patriot relief force under Brigadier General Nicholas Herkimer consisting of some 800 Tryon County militiamen and 60 Oneida Indians in the Battle of Oriskany (August 6) just six miles short of their goal, but a concurrent sortie by the Fort Stanwix garrison destroyed one of St. Leger’s three base camps. General Schuyler, although already outnumbered by Burgoyne’s advancing force, nonetheless took the risky move of detaching Major General Benedict Arnold and 950 men and sending them to the relief of Fort Stanwix. A ruse by Arnold convinced St. Leger that he had more men than was the case. With his Indian allies departing and short of supplies, on August 23, St. Leger decamped and withdrew back into Canada. Arnold briefly pursued and then left 700 men in garrison at Fort Stanwix and rushed back to rejoin Schuyler. St. Leger never

John Trumbull’s painting Burgoyne’s Surrender at Saratoga. Defeat of the British forces here brought to a close their 1777 effort to split off New England from the rest of the colonies and led to the French government’s decision to enter the war openly on the American side. (Yale University Art Gallery)

204 | Saratoga Campaign

joined Burgoyne. A subsequent renewed effort was called off when he learned of Burgoyne’s surrender. Difficulties continued to pile up for Burgoyne. Howe’s campaign against Philadelphia was delayed. Leaving about one-third of his army under Clinton to garrison New York, on July 23, Howe had put to sea with some 16,000 men, sailing to the head of Chesapeake Bay to approach Philadelphia from the south. Washington shifted his army to central New Jersey so that he could act in either direction, but as Burgoyne moved deeper into upper New York from Canada, Washington was obliged to detach some of his best troops and most capable commanders to reinforce that front. The opportunity to cut off and destroy a British army away from Royal Navy support was simply too tempting. Once Howe’s intentions were clear, Washington had ample time to move southward and take up position to protect Philadelphia. Although Washington met defeat in the Battle of Brandywine (September 11), he managed to withdraw his army in good order. By the end of September, Howe had seized the Patriot capital of Philadelphia, but it was in fact a hollow victory, devoid of all military significance. Burgoyne’s Indian allies were now proving to be a decidedly mixed blessing. They were, of course, a source of intelligence and an excellent screening force that was good at skirmishing. Burgoyne had hoped that their presence would also intimidate the settlers into submission, but the Indian massacre of civilians created hostility toward the British and led to the widespread mobilization of militiamen. The Patriot side secured a great propaganda advantage with the killing and scalping on July 27 of a white woman, Jane McCrea, ironically the fiancée of a British Army officer serving in

Burgoyne’s forces. Burgoyne had planned to punish the perpetrators but was informed that if he were to do so, the Indians would decamp en masse. Major General Horatio Gates, Schuyler’s successor, was able to use this failure on Burgoyne’s part to great propaganda advantage. Later, anticipating disaster, the Indians melted away, a serious loss for the British in gathering intelligence on American dispositions. Burgoyne now faced a difficult decision. By mid-August, he knew that Howe would not be reinforcing him (information he refused to share with his staff) and that St. Leger had been blocked. Burgoyne also knew that winter would freeze over his Lake Champlain supply line, and communications to Canada were now threatened by Patriot actions against Fort Ticonderoga. Burgoyne had only 30 days of provisions for his 7,000 men and the civilians. Local supplies were practically nonexistent as a result of Schuyler’s actions. Burgoyne’s long supply lines and Schuyler’s skillfully planned retreat after he had destroyed the countryside were the keys to the campaign. On August 16, Burgoyne suffered a disaster in the Battle of Bennington. He had detached a sizable force of German auxiliaries to secure necessary provisions from the countryside, but American militiamen under Brigadier General John Stark cut off and surrounded Colonel Friedrich Baum’s regiment at Bennington, Vermont. In the battle, the British side lost 207 killed and 696 captured versus American casualties of only 30 killed or wounded. The Patriots also secured weapons and supplies. However, Schuyler’s continued withdrawals and aloof manner made him unpopular with his men. His longtime rival, General Gates, was also intriguing against him in Congress, and many members,



including John Adams, did not understand his delaying tactics. On August 10, over the objections of the New York delegation, Congress relieved Schuyler of command and replaced him with Gates. Gates took up the command on August 19 but soon quarreled with Arnold. Burgoyne’s advance, impeded at every turn by the Americans and slowed by the need to construct some dozens of bridges and causeways across swamps and creeks, was now only about a mile a day. On September 13–14, the British crossed the Hudson River on a bridge of rafts. The troops at last reached Saratoga, only a few miles from their goal of Albany, but they found their way halted in a series of battles fought for control of the main Albany road. Collectively known as the Battles of Saratoga, the battles were Freeman’s Farm, or First Saratoga, and Bemis Heights, or Second Saratoga. Meanwhile, Continental Army major general Benjamin Lincoln collected some 2,000 men and, dividing them into three groups, sent them to Skenesborough (which the British had abandoned), Mount Independence (which was captured), and Fort Ticonderoga. Although the defenders at Ticonderoga were surprised by the American attack there on September 18–21, the attackers lacked sufficient numbers to retake the fortress, even though Continental Army colonel John Brown’s men did free 100 American prisoners and capture 300 British soldiers. The Patriots then withdrew to Saratoga on Gates’s orders. The Battle of Freeman’s Farm, also known as the First Battle of Saratoga, occurred on the afternoon of September 19. Some 9,000 Continental Army and militia troops, their right flank anchored on the Hudson River, had established a fortified position of redoubts and breastworks on

Saratoga Campaign | 205

Bemis Heights, south of a 15-acre clearing known as Freeman’s Farm. Burgoyne opened the battle when he ordered three of his regiments to attack across the clearing to dislodge the Americans from Bemis Heights. The attack went poorly. Colonel Daniel Morgan and Arnold halted the advance, with Morgan’s riflemen inflicting heavy casualties on the British, especially officers. Fortunately for Burgoyne, Gates refused to leave his entrenchments to support Arnold and Morgan. German forces turned the American right flank. That night, the British encamped on the field, but they had failed to dislodge the Americans on Bemis Heights, the object of their attack. The British had also sustained some 600 casualties. The Americans lost half that number. Meanwhile, Clinton, having received reinforcements from Britain, attempted too late to move up the Hudson in support of Burgoyne. On October 3, Clinton sailed up the Hudson with 3,000 men. The British captured Forts Clinton and Montgomery on the Hudson Highlands, but news of these victories never reached Burgoyne, as the messengers were all taken prisoner. Some of Clinton’s men reached as far north as Livingston Manor on October 16 before turning back. Gates was also unaware of this activity until after the Battle of Bemis Heights. The Americans were now reinforced, and by the time of the second battle, Gates had some 11,500 men to only 6,617 for Burgoyne. At a council of war on October 5, Burgoyne’s officers pressed him to retreat while there was still an opportunity, but he steadfastly refused and ordered a full-scale attack in an attempt to turn the American flank. This prompted the Battle of Bemis Heights, or Second Saratoga, on October 7. Gates committed Morgan’s riflemen on the

206 | Schuyler, Philip

British right flank. Brigadier General Ebenezer Learned’s brigade was in the center, and Brigadier General Enoch Poor’s brigade was on the left. Gates’s refusal to commit his entire force mitigated the British defeat, but Arnold, who had quarreled with Gates and removed himself from command, disregarded orders and charged onto the field to lead a general American assault that took two British redoubts. In the battle, the Americans sustained only about 130 casualties to 600 for the British. General Fraser was among the British losses, having been mortally wounded by an American rifleman. On October 8, Burgoyne ordered a general retreat, only to find that the Americans had blocked that possibility. On October 17, aware that Clinton would be unable to relieve him and with Gates now commanding 15,000–18,000 men, Burgoyne formally surrendered his army of 5,895. Burgoyne insisted that it be known as a “convention” rather than a “capitulation,” and Gates agreed to grant the British troops parole on condition that they not serve in America again. When Burgoyne subsequently failed to provide a list of men in his army so that the terms might be enforced, Congress declared the agreement null and void, and the men remained prisoners. Burgoyne was eventually cleared of any misconduct, but the defeat marked the end of his military career. The British lost not only at Saratoga but also at Ticonderoga and the Highlands. All they had to show for the year’s campaigning was the occupation of Philadelphia. The war now became a major issue in British politics. More important, the Battle of Saratoga caused France to change its policy. On December 4, Benjamin Franklin received the news of Burgoyne’s surrender in Paris, and two days later, King Louis XVI

approved an alliance with the United States. A treaty was signed on February 6, 1778, and on March 17, Great Britain and France were at war. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Hargrove, Richard J. General John Burgoyne. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1983. Ketchum, Richard M. Saratoga: Turning Point of America’s Revolutionary War. New York: Henry Holt, 1997. Lunt, James. John Burgoyne of Saratoga. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1975. Nelson, Paul David. General Horatio Gates: A Biography. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1976. Pancake, John S. 1777: The Year of the Hangman. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1977. Stone, W. L. The Campaign of Lieut. Gen. John Burgoyne and the Expedition of Lieut. Col. Barry St. Leger. 1877. Reprint, New York: J. Munsell, 1970. Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. Vol. 2. New York: Macmillan, 1952.

Schuyler, Philip(1733–1804) Philip Schuyler was a politician and Continental Army officer. He was born into a prominent New York family on November 20, 1733, at Albany, New York, and reared in the aristocratic traditions of the Hudson Valley. During the French and Indian War (1754–1763), he served as a provincial officer. In the course of that conflict, Schuyler not only learned the intricacies of army supply but also garnered substantial personal profits and closely studied English business practices. In 1763, Schuyler inherited thousands of acres of land in the Mohawk Valley of



upstate New York. He subsequently settled at Saratoga, conducting extensive lumbering operations. Now a rich and successful businessman, he entered New York politics and was elected to the New York Provincial Assembly in 1768. As a member of the Assembly for the next seven years, Schuyler became embroiled in the political quarrels over how Americans should respond to Britain’s attempts to tax and regulate its colonies. He was openly hostile to ministerial and parliamentary attempts that interfered with colonial commerce. At the same time, however, Schuyler hoped for reconciliation between the Crown and the American colonies. It soon became clear to Schuyler that he had no choice but to align with the Patriots. On April 20, 1775, he was elected a delegate to the Second Continental Congress. Impressing his fellow delegates, on June 15, he was appointed a major general in the Continental Army and given command of the Northern Department. Two weeks later, he returned to New York and prepared for an invasion of Canada, supervising the acquisition of provisions and the mobilization of troops. He also secured the neutrality of the Iroquois Confederacy. In August 1775, Schuyler and his secondin-command, Brigadier General Richard Montgomery, departed Fort Ticonderoga with a force of about 500 soldiers, advanced down Lake Champlain, and began siege operations against St. Johns. On September 15, however, Schuyler fell ill and was compelled to turn over command to Montgomery. The following spring, as the Americans retreated from Canada, Schuyler assisted them and cooperated with a congressional committee sent to assess the military situation in New York. On June 18, Congress appointed Major General Horatio Gates to command the army in Canada, but by that

Schuyler, Philip | 207

time, the troops had already withdrawn into Schuyler’s Northern Department. With both Schuyler and Gates insisting on their right to command, Congress decided on July 8 in Schuyler’s favor, and Gates reluctantly took command at Fort Ticonderoga. During the summer of 1776, Schuyler, Gates, and Major General Benedict Arnold worked to build small warships on Lake Champlain to thwart British plans to capture Fort Ticonderoga. Although the American flotilla was defeated on the lake that October, its presence had prevented a British invasion that year. Schuyler, always sensitive to criticism, was annoyed when New England delegates in Congress caviled about his military leadership. This led to some sharp exchanges in early 1777. On March 25, Congress reprimanded Schuyler for his remarks, and Gates was given an independent command at Fort Ticonderoga. Schuyler sought to reverse the decision. On May 15, he succeeded in getting himself reinstated as overall commander of the Northern Department. Gates then began maneuvering in Congress to replace Schuyler. This came at the expense of preparations for a renewed British invasion from Canada led by Lieutenant General John Burgoyne. On July 5, Brigadier General Arthur St. Clair, whom Schuyler had placed in command of Fort Ticonderoga, was forced to evacuate that post. Schuyler’s delaying tactics against Burgoyne in the next few weeks contributed substantially to the eventual American victory over Burgoyne. However, his tactical withdrawals, pointed out by Gates, fueled opposition in Congress. Therefore, on August 4, Congress voted to relieve Schuyler, replacing him with Gates, who thus became the victor over Burgoyne on October 17, 1777. All Schuyler had to show for his efforts were his humiliating treatment

208 | Slavery

by Congress and the destruction of his country home at Saratoga by the British Army. In 1778, Schuyler insisted on a court of inquiry to clear his name. After months of acrimonious wrangling, a court-martial was convened on October 1, 1778. After producing many witnesses and documents to prove that he had done his duty, Schuyler was found blameless. Nevertheless, his reputation as a soldier was irreparably damaged, and on April 19, 1779, he resigned his commission. Elected to Congress in 1779, Schuyler continued his efforts to improve the army, and he also encouraged currency reform. From April to August 1780, he served effectively as chairman of a committee to assist General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, in reorganizing the various departments of the army and in cooperating with America’s French allies. Between 1780 and 1797, Schuyler served sporadically as a state senator. Closely associated with his son-in-law Alexander Hamilton, Schuyler was a strong supporter of the U.S. Constitution of 1787. He served as a U.S. senator in 1789–1791 and again in 1797–1798. Schuyler died in Albany on November 18, 1804. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Bush, Martin H. Revolutionary Enigma: A Re-Appraisal of General Philip Schuyler of New York. Port Washington, NY: I. J. Friedman, 1969. Gerlach, Don R. Proud Patriot: Philip Schuyler and the War of Independence, 1775– 1783. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1987. Nelson, Paul David. General Horatio Gates: A Biography. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1976.

Rossie, Jonathan Gregory. The Politics of Command in the American Revolution. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1975.

Slavery In 1775, one-fifth of the 2.5 million inhabitants of nonnative ancestry living in the 13 colonies were African or descendants of Africans. The great majority of these individuals were enslaved; perhaps only 5 percent were free. Although slavery existed in all colonies, its distribution, practices, and conditions varied between almost unimaginable extremes. With about 188,000 slaves (40 percent of its total population), Virginia had nearly twice as many slaves as South Carolina, which had the second-highest number of slaves at just more than 100,000. But because of a much smaller white population, South Carolina had more slaves per capita than Virginia. The major sources of income—tobacco in Virginia and rice in South Carolina— heavily depended on slave labor. Slave quarters in Virginia were clustered near the master’s house. This close proximity, designed to ensure a constant watch over their “property,” also increased the fears and nightmares that some masters had of being attacked by slaves. The fear was not completely unfounded, given the occasional murder of masters on plantations. In South Carolina, slave quarters adjoined the swampy rice fields and were distant from the plantation house. This space, designed to protect the health of owners, enabled enslaved people to preserve much of their African culture. In contrast, the plantations of North Carolina and Maryland, each with between 60,000 and 70,000 slaves, were significantly

Slavery | 209

smaller and engaged in a greater variety of activities. Maryland planters, not wedded to the labor-intensive crops of tobacco and rice, found that a smaller workforce devoted to grain and timber could produce a satisfactory income. Some Maryland slaves labored in the very nontraditional field of ironwork. Furthermore, as some Marylanders decided that a free Black worker, hired only when necessary, was more economical than a slave, a growing number of free Black inhabitants appeared in Maryland during the second half of the eighteenth century. Georgia, a frontier colony established in the early 1730s as a barrier to Spanish Florida, had at first prohibited slavery. But by the 1770s, Georgia’s economy was growing, in large part due to rice cultivation and slave labor. Although there were fewer slaves in Georgia (about 15,000) than in New York, they were approximately equal to the new colony’s white population. New York’s nearly 20,000 slaves, the most of any northern colony, were scattered along Hudson River farms and in New York City trades. In New Jersey, which ranked behind New York as a northern slaveholding colony (with a little less than half of New York’s total), slaves filled a labor shortage in the northern and eastern parts of the colony. Besides working on farms, New Jersey slaves also worked in the colony’s numerous ironworks. Although Delaware is considered southern because it was south of the Mason-Dixon Line, the governor of Pennsylvania also served as governor of Delaware (which rated only a lieutenant governor in residence). Slaves in these two colonies (numbering a little less than those in New Jersey) labored as servants, field hands, shipyard workers, and ironworkers. New England slaves, numbering only 2 percent of the colonial total, were owned by

farmers and tradesmen. The ratio of slaves in northern colonies had been in decline throughout most of the eighteenth century. Whatever the numbers, slavery was a visible and vital element of the colonial society and economy, especially in the South. But as recognized by some contemporaries, it was inherently a fragile system supported by local laws and customs. What protected the institution more than anything had little to do with masters or laws. Slaves lived in an enemy society—one in which there was no refuge to shelter a runaway slave. Furthermore, roads were few and easily patrolled; strangers, white or Black, stood out and were questioned in both small communities and the largest of colonial towns. Finally, slave owners offered substantial rewards for runaways. Thus, the likelihood of an individual escaping slavery under normal circumstances remained quite small. War or the threat of war was a constant of colonial life. Yet, war also offered opportunity. Tradesmen could demand and receive higher wages, and merchants could secure very profitable contracts to supply military forces. Slaves with skills, such as blacksmiths and boat pilots, were sometimes permitted to keep part of the higher fees paid to their owners. Furthermore, when times and communities were truly desperate for soldiers, slaves could be recruited for military service and would sometimes be rewarded with freedom. For slaves, the American Revolutionary War would be unlike any war they or the colonists had experienced. The role of the British as an antislavery force in the American Revolution has finally begun to receive the recognition it deserves. On April 20, 1775, John Murray, Lord Dunmore, the royal governor of Virginia, concerned that verbal threats against royal authority might lead to rebellion in his colony, had marines from a warship remove

210 | Slavery

gunpowder from the Williamsburg powder magazine. Armed citizens gathered, local leaders tried to calm the crowd, and Lord Dunmore announced on April 22 that he would free slaves and burn Williamsburg if British officials were injured. All of this occurred before the news of Lexington and Concord (April 19) reached Williamsburg on the evening of April 28. Driven from Williamsburg and trying to raise a military force to oppose the rebellion, on November 15, 1775, Lord Dunmore offered freedom to the slaves and servants of rebel masters who were willing to take up arms. Dunmore’s action initiated an ongoing policy that British officials would follow with varied degrees of support and interpretation. Thus, plantation owners saw the British government as intent on destroying their lives, liberty, and livelihoods. William Lee, the personal servant of General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, was freed in Washington’s will. Other slaves at Mount Vernon (Washington’s estate in northern Virginia) did not depend on a master’s will to gain freedom. In 1776, a slave named Harry, who had run away from Mount Vernon in 1771 and had been recaptured within a week, successfully escaped during the war by boarding a British naval vessel in the Potomac River. Harry became a corporal in the Black Pioneers and settled in New Brunswick, Canada, with other Black veterans and their families after the war. He later relocated to Sierra Leone. By 1779, British officials and generals recognized that the war had clearly changed character. Instead of an armed protest by a minority of colonists over modest taxes spent largely for their defense, America was a large and virtually independent nation with a powerful ally, France, which posed a direct threat to Great Britain. Among the

adjustments made by British officials was the Phillipsburg Proclamation of June 30, 1779. Issued by Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton from the Phillipsburg Manor just north of New York City, it promised that slaves escaping rebel masters would receive freedom to pursue the occupation of their choice with the British. The proclamation did not require military service. However, the offer did not apply to slaves seized from rebel masters by British forces—such individuals would be sold for the benefit of their captors—nor did the proclamation apply to the slaves of Loyalist masters. The Phillipsburg Proclamation was effective in the South, but its implementation was uneven, with some slaves being sold back to rebel masters. The war was nevertheless an unprecedented opportunity to escape slavery. The number of slaves who heeded Lord Dunmore’s proclamation is unknown. Of approximately 500 slaves who found refuge with Dunmore, most died within a year— victims of the smallpox epidemic that swept the North American continent. The pattern of reaching British lines and dying of disease continued throughout the revolution. Of the slaves who joined the British (estimates vary from 20,000 to 100,000), probably one-half to two-thirds died of disease. The isolation of plantation life had probably reduced the resistance of many slaves to the diseases they encountered as they journeyed to and settled within crowded British camps. Of the people who fled slavery, about one-third were adult males of fighting age. Clearly, enslaved people—from the hundreds who joined Dunmore in 1776 to the thousands who sought freedom at Yorktown in the summer and fall of 1781—viewed the appearance of British forces as a practical opportunity to reach freedom.

Slavery | 211

To discourage Blacks from joining British forces, states enacted and enforced punishments that included death. Traditionally, colonial courts were reluctant to execute slaves because that involved the destruction of their owners’ property. But during the revolution, slaves were executed by officials who were fearful that leniency would only encourage others to head to British lines. Slaves whose owners joined the British were usually confiscated by states and sold to new owners. Slaves who accompanied masters joining the British found themselves still slaves at the end of the war. Clearly, while the British provided an opportunity for some slaves to gain freedom, the chances of success were limited. Occasionally, slaves found themselves deserted by owners who fled when enemy forces appeared or were rumored to be in the vicinity. In Georgia, some Loyalist plantation owners fled in 1776, and in 1779, Patriot plantation owners did so after the British took Savannah. In both cases, slaves might remain on plantations, seek refuge in the military camps of either side, or be seized by either side. Some disappeared into sparsely settled areas, as did many whites, hoping to escape the war entirely. Soon after taking command of American soldiers outside Boston in June 1775, General Washington ordered a ban on the use of Black soldiers, as he did not want the army to become a haven for runaway slaves. But by the end of the same year, the need for soldiers prompted Washington to permit the enlistment of free Blacks with military experience into Continental Army regiments. In early 1777, Washington dropped the prior military service requirement. As the war continued and the need for counties to fulfill recruitment quotas increased, slave owners could take a slave to the county courthouse, sign the manumission papers,

and have the now-freed individual enlisted into the army. The former slave, now a “free” man, became the substitute who exempted the former master from military service. Naturally, the substitute had to be able bodied. When one Virginian tried to use a 12-year-old slave boy as his substitute for military service, local officials refused. American Revolutionary War veterans were usually eligible for free land and pensions. The free land was often the least desirable, however, and at a considerable distance, and the pensions did not begin until well into the nineteenth century, but the offer attracted both whites and Blacks to military service. Altogether, perhaps 5,000 Blacks, with more coming from the northern states than from the southern states, served in the American army and navy during the revolution. Among the many issues that the revolution forced people to consider, none was more controversial than that of slavery. Many Americans had no problem fighting for freedom from the British while defending their right to own slaves. This position, often cited by British commentators as typical rebel hypocrisy, embarrassed many Americans. Even before the war, there had been a small but growing movement against slavery. The wave of evangelicalism that swept the colonies in the generation before the revolution had a strong antislavery element. A few Methodist and Baptist ministers openly questioned the morality of slavery, and Quakers began to pressure fellow members to free their slaves. Once the war began, the issue was considered in some state legislatures. Pennsylvania set the pattern in 1780 by providing for gradual emancipation, followed by Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New York in the mid1780s. “Gradual” meant that slavery would end in Connecticut in 1848. The pattern of

212 | Slavery

gradual emancipation of slaves in northern states after the revolution usually included immediate restrictions on “free” Blacks. Southern plantation owners, most of whom supported the revolution, found themselves under tremendous economic pressure as the war continued. The advantages of slave labor diminished as war and enemy ships greatly reduced the export of tobacco, rice, and indigo. Furthermore, planters were disappointed when their business relations with French merchants sometimes proved as difficult as those with British merchants before the war. Some planters tried to store crops in the hope that an end to the war would enable them to sell. Instead, enemy raids often destroyed the stores. In Virginia, the assumption of planters that independence would at least cancel their debts to British merchants proved false. The legislature, desperate for income, decided that money once due to British merchants was now owed to the state. The war was a most difficult time for plantation owners. Yet, of all the sacrifices they made, slavery was not one. In 1779, as the war began to shift southward and the military was desperate for men, Congress offered South Carolina and Georgia slave owners $1,000 for each man they could send to the army. That meant turning a slave into a free soldier. The offer was all but ignored. The American Revolution included many participants from outside the rebelling colonies. Fascinated by the land and its varied societies, observers often recorded their observations. But whether the individuals came from Great Britain, France, Spain, or the German states, the area that fascinated them most was the South and its slave-based plantation society. They recognized that the size of plantations and the power of the master over his slave labor force made this a unique society.

While plantation owners modeled themselves after English gentlemen, their authority as slave owners was total. They lacked the titles of English nobility but enjoyed and exercised far more power. Hence, even sympathetic observers had difficulty accepting the claims of British oppression voiced by the owners of slaves. Slavery and those who had fled to British lines to escape it became an issue in the Treaty of Paris (1783). Article 7, dedicated to establishing “a firm and perpetual peace . . ., and his Britanic Majesty shall, with all convenient speed & without causing any Destruction or carrying away any Negroes, or other property of the American Inhabitants withdraw . . . from the said United States.” Naturally, slave owners were most anxious that Article 7 be enforced. When Washington met Lieutenant General Sir Guy Carleton in May 1783 to discuss the evacuation of British forces, the subject of runaway slaves was first on the Virginian’s list. Washington understood that Dunmore’s proclamation and the Phillipsburg Proclamations could form the basis of a legitimate claim on British protection. What concerned him was the belief that many runaway slaves were daily entering British lines. He believed that forms purporting to date the entry of individual slaves were not accurately completed by British officials. Carleton explained that the “property” protected by Article 7 referred to property owned by Americans when the Preliminary Treaty was signed. Hence, in 1783, much to Washington’s disgust and in violation of his orders from London, Carleton evacuated all slaves from New York City to freedom. Naturally, each side interpreted parts of the treaty to the disadvantage of the other. While both sides promised to pay “lawful debts” to each other, most debts were due to British creditors, and Congress lacked the



authority to enforce that provision on unwilling states. The Virginia legislature, which had taken over collection of planters’ debts due to British merchants to raise state funds, announced the cancellation of any payment to British creditors. At the conclusion of the American Revolution, the economy of the new nation appeared in ruins. Independence meant exclusion from the ports of Britain’s colonies; the loss of British bounties that helped make tobacco, rice, and indigo such profitable exports; and the need for merchants to establish new and reliable trading partners in distant ports. With postwar income reduced from prewar levels and the needed repair or replacement of war-damaged property and infrastructure, the payment of debts (private, state, and national) seemed to be both necessary and impossible tasks. In the postwar decade of economic depression and with slave prices down, some contemporaries believed that slavery might disappear, as it no longer seemed profitable. For other contemporaries, especially Southerners, the British encouragement of runaway slaves remained a personal, economic attack that far exceeded the needs and customs of war. Thus, while northern states were gradually ending slavery, southern states became more focused on it as a necessity of life. The faith of Southerners in their peculiar institution seemed justified as the economy recovered in the 1790s and rice and cotton boomed. It might be said that the American Revolution shook the very foundations of slavery. Rebellion against Great Britain ended the bounties that helped make rice and tobacco such profitable crops, made the export of any produce and the import of any return most hazardous, and forced planters to enter business relations with foreign merchants. Slave owners, like many colonists,

Steuben, Friedrich von | 213

had been surprised when a dispute over taxes and trade regulation evolved into a full-scale revolution. But what dismayed many American colonists gave hope to their society’s enslaved people. Traditionally, colonial wars presented a few slaves with the opportunity to gain freedom through military service, seek refuge with the enemy, or make escape attempts amid the chaos. The revolution expanded these previously limited opportunities. Although the American Civil War is more closely identified with the end of slavery, it was the American Revolution that pushed the issue into public consciousness, political debate, and legislative action. The revolution that ended the colonial status of most Americans marked the beginning of the long road to freedom for their slaves. Joseph A. Goldenberg

Further Reading Egerton, Douglas R. Death or Liberty: African Americans and Revolutionary America. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. Kulikoff, Alan. Tobacco and Slaves: The Development of Southern Cultures in the Chesapeake, 1680–1800. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1986. Pybus, Cassandra. Epic Journeys of Freedom: The Slaves and the American Revolution. Boston: Beacon, 2006. Schama, Simon. Rough Crossings: Britain, the Slaves and the American Revolution. London: BBC Books, 2005.

Steuben, Friedrich von (1730–1794) Friedrich von Steuben was a Prussian military officer and inspector general of the Continental Army. He was born Friedrich Wilhelm Ludolf Gerhard Augustin von

214 | Steuben, Friedrich von

Steuben in Magdeburg, Germany, on September 17, 1730. In 1746, he entered the officer corps of the Prussian Army as a lance corporal. He saw service during the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), learning much about army administration, siege warfare, and other general military matters, and rose to the rank of captain. Discharged at the end of hostilities, Steuben spent a number of years acting as a chamberlain to a Hohenzollern prince, during which time he seems to have given himself the title “Baron.” In June 1777, he went to Paris and sought a commission in the American Continental Army. American diplomats Benjamin Franklin and Silas Deane were impressed by his military credentials, which falsely presented him as a lieutenant general and quartermaster general of the king of Prussia. Steuben agreed to go to America as a volunteer in the revolutionary cause without rank or pay. Steuben arrived at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on December 1, 1777. Subsequently feted by Congress, he joined General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, in February 1778. Steuben made a strong impression on Washington, a shrewd judge of men and character, and was appointed to serve as acting inspector general. Steuben’s first assignment was to drill and discipline the troops. This was no easy task, as Steuben knew no English and worked through interpreters. The soldiers were so taken by the personable Steuben that they responded enthusiastically to his methods. By April, he was employing four assistant inspectors and was drilling the entire army. Steuben’s work was immensely important in enabling the army to subsequently fight on a more equal footing with its British opponent.

In May 1778, Steuben became the permanent inspector general with the rank of major general. He contributed materially to American success during the Battle of Monmouth, New Jersey (June 28, 1778). A military manual that Steuben prepared, titled Regulations for the Order and Discipline of the Troops of the United States, was particularly valuable. Known as the “Blue Book,” it remained the basic drill manual for the U.S. Army until the War of 1812. During 1779 and most of 1780, Steuben labored effectively as inspector general, and Washington consulted him on all strategic and logistical matters. In the autumn of 1780, when Major General Nathanael Greene became commander of the Southern Department, Steuben accompanied Greene southward to assist in reorganizing military administration. When they reached Richmond, Virginia, Steuben was directed to remain there, securing men and supplies to fight the British in the South. He was thwarted in his efforts by Virginia’s slow response and the exhausted state of its economy, a consequence of destructive British raids in the eastern part of the state. Fairly or not, Steuben and other Continental Army officers blamed Governor Thomas Jefferson for much of the problem. When Loyalists destroyed a large quantity of military stores left unprotected at Point of Fork on June 6, 1781, Steuben was excoriated by Virginia politicians for the loss. They sought to make him the scapegoat for Virginia’s less than satisfactory support of the war effort and asked for an investigation of his conduct. Although nothing came of these recriminations, this was the low point of Steuben’s American Revolutionary War service. In early September, Steuben joined Continental forces at Williamsburg for the



Sullivan-Clinton Expedition against the Iroquois | 215

subsequent siege of Yorktown (September 27–October 19, 1781). Washington gave him command of a division, and Steuben provided valuable advice on the conduct of the siege that led to the British capitulation on October 19, 1781. Steuben then returned to his duties as inspector general. In the spring of 1783, Steuben assisted Washington in drafting a plan for a postwar military establishment, and when peace was declared later in the year, he helped to demobilize the Continental Army. Steuben resigned his commission on March 24, 1784, but remained in the United States. He settled in New York, renting a large estate on Manhattan, and quickly established himself as an important figure in the social life of the city and the state. Very soon, however, he experienced financial difficulties, which he blamed on his many expenses incurred during the war, although he admitted that he had never been able to live within his means. The New York legislature granted him 16,000 acres of undeveloped land north of Utica, but this did little to alleviate his financial distress. In the fall of 1787, Steuben was compelled to abandon his estate on Manhattan and move into a boardinghouse on Wall Street. He was so deeply in debt by the end of 1788 that two friends, Alexander Hamilton and Benjamin Walker, assumed control of his finances. When Hamilton became secretary of the treasury in 1789, he became an advocate for Steuben in the national government. In August, Steuben submitted his war expense claims to Congress, and in June 1790, the legislators granted him an annual pension of $2,500. Steuben died near Utica, New York, on November 18, 1794. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Adelson, Bruce. Baron Von Steuben: American General. New York: Chelsea House Publications, 2001. Chase, Philander D. “Baron von Steuben in the War of Independence.” PhD dissertation, Duke University, 1972. Ueberhorst, Horst. Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben: Soldier and Democrat. Baltimore: Moos, 1981.

Sullivan-Clinton Expedition against the Iroquois(1779) The Sullivan-Clinton expedition was a savage Patriot military campaign directed not at the British but instead against Native Americans. It aimed to break the power of the Iroquois Confederacy and seize control of western New York state, northeastern Pennsylvania, and the Ohio Country. The campaign was chiefly conducted by Major General John Sullivan and Brigadier General James Clinton in 1779. Unfolding mainly in upstate New York, eastern Pennsylvania, and the Ohio Country during the American Revolutionary War, it resulted in a near catastrophe for the Native Americans. Following these 1779 scorched-earth attacks by Sullivan, Clinton, and Colonels Goose Van Schaick and Daniel Brodhead, the European Americans were known to eastern Native Americans as the “Town Destroyers.” Typically, American histories slim the coordinated assaults by these military operatives down to the Sullivan expedition, ignoring the full intent and extent of the orders of Continental Army commander general George Washington. Washington in fact ordered Sullivan, his lead general, to destroy the Iroquois utterly, not because of

216 | Sullivan-Clinton Expedition against the Iroquois

their alliance with the British but instead, very specifically, because he considered them the enemy. Washington consequently ordered that their settlements be totally destroyed. Washington thus ordered total war, for the people included were women, children, and the elderly. The American battle cry of danger to settlers on the frontier served as a pretext and a rationale for committing genocide, the preferred method for clearing the land of its original people in favor of European settlers. Furthermore, Washington had what today would be viewed as a serious conflict of interest in ordering the attacks, for the ultimate prize was the Ohio Country, and the Washington family basically owned the Ohio Company, which speculated heavily in real estate that was then in the fiercely protected possession of Native American nations. Indeed, Washington had personally surveyed Ohio Company land for speculation before and during the French and Indian War (1754–1763). Moreover, the Continental Congress paid its army recruits in land warrants issued for property to be seized in Ohio. The only way to settle its debts was to actually break the Iroquois Confederacy and appropriate Ohio from the Native American nations there, a move that would personally enrich Washington. The failure to secure Ohio might mean that the United States would be unable to pay its debts and establish its financial and political credit. These complex interactions explain Washington’s determination to break the Iroquois and seize Ohio. To ensure the defeat of the Iroquois, Congress authorized Washington to raise a force of 5,163 men, to be shared among Van Schaick (558 men), Clinton (1,500), and Sullivan (2,500), with Brodhead to join the

fray, operating with his 605 men from Fort Pitt. By contrast, the Iroquois, at their peak in 1777, had but 1,000 warriors, and by 1779, those numbers had dwindled. Washington’s plan called for a twopronged attack by the forces under Sullivan at Easton, New Jersey, and under Clinton at Canajoharie, New York, converging on upstate and western New York. Van Schaick was to specifically target the Onondagas, the perceived seat of Iroquoian government. Meanwhile, Brodhead was to move north from Fort Pitt to meet up with the combined forces of Sullivan, Clinton, and Van Schaick in western New York, thus cutting the New York Iroquois off from Pennsylvania and Ohio aid. If possible, after devastating the Iroquois, the armies were to march on Niagara, the British headquarters, but that was always more of a desire than an actual war goal. In fact, because of Sullivan’s dawdling, Van Schaick’s attack occurred in April 1779, well before the main force set out. On April 21, at Onondaga Castle, New York, his force attacked the Indian settlement at Onondaga Creek, burning Onondaga Castle. Most of the Indians were able to escape into the woods. Van Schaick then retired to Fort Schuyler. Also ready in April, Brodhead was told to stand down, but he went ahead with his original orders, establishing forts along the Allegheny Mountains in the spring and summer and setting off on August 6, 1779, to meet Sullivan’s force. Finally, on August 9, Sullivan and Clinton simultaneously lumbered out of their separate headquarters, meeting up at Tioga. Whereas Van Schaick marched with the main body, Brodhead never quite met up with it, attaining only Olean Point, 40 miles distant from the main force.



Sullivan-Clinton Expedition against the Iroquois | 217

The Iroquois did not want the war, avoided participating in it as long as they could, and, once coerced into it, chose removing women, children, and the elderly from harm’s way over standing to fight the Continental Army. At the outset of AmericanBritish hostilities in 1775, Iroquois speakers explicitly told both sides that they wished to remain neutral. This did not stop the Americans from attacking any and all tribes, including those allied with them, or the British from deliberately engineering an attack by the Americans on the neutral Seneca in the Battle of Oriskany to drag the Iroquois into the war on the side of the Crown. The resultant disagreement among Iroquois nations as to their loyalty simply meant that the issue was tabled, with each of the constituent nations free to form its own policy. The league itself was not dissolved, as many historians still erroneously assert. By the time of the one set-piece engagement of the Sullivan-Clinton expedition, fought at Newtown (Elmira, New York) on August 29, 1779, the confederated forces under Joseph Brant (or Thayendanega), the Mohawk war chief, and Colonel John Butler, the Loyalist commander, had been seriously thinned. According to Butler, the combined strength of the British and Native American forces amounted to fewer than 600 men the day of the Newtown battle. In his formal report, Sullivan greatly exaggerated this number to 1,500, but even his own commanders challenged that count at the time; historians since then have pegged the Native American numbers as those reported by Brant and Butler. Meanwhile, whereas Sullivan’s men had been feasting their way across Iroquois land on crops they were soon destroying, the British and their Native American allies were literally starving. The Battle of Newtown was

therefore a complete rout of the Iroquois, but the Native Americans’ goal had never been to defeat Sullivan’s army. The Iroquois were simply buying time to evacuate their people. The American attacks of 1779 had the intended genocidal effect, destroying a total of at least 60 towns. Van Schaick razed three towns, Brodhead razed 16, and Sullivan-Clinton razed 41. The destruction was complete, with all housing within the sweep of the combined armies burned, all crops looted or burned, household and farm implements destroyed or looted, and the once magnificent peach and apple orchards of the confederation cut down. The American soldiers also took numerous scalps for the lucrative bounties that the states and Congress offered on Native American dead. American soldiers also reportedly skinned some Native Americans, making shoes and other items from their tanned hides. American casualties in the expedition were few, but the operation was devastating for the Native Americans. Because previous American attacks in 1778 had already induced famine in Iroquoia, there was no buffer for the effects of the Sullivan-Clinton expedition. In addition, the winter of 1779– 1780 was the most severe on record, with New York Harbor freezing solid and snows drifting several feet high from New York through Ohio. Hundreds, or perhaps thousands, died as an immediate result of the starvation caused by the attacks. Most of the surviving Iroquois became refugees— 5,036 at Niagara and another 5,000 at British Detroit, where they survived on supplies provided by the British. Meanwhile, the Americans lost no time in seizing the land that had recently hosted Iroquoian farms. Barbara Alice Mann

218 | Sullivan-Clinton Expedition against the Iroquois

Further Reading Cook, Frederick. Journals of the Military Expedition of Major General John Sullivan against the Six Nations of Indians in 1779. 1887. Reprint, Freeport, NY: Books for Libraries Press, 1972.

Graymont, Barbara. The Iroquois in the American Revolution. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1972. Mann, Barbara Alice. George Washington’s War on Native America, 1779–1782. Westport, CT: Praeger, 2005.

T Tarleton, Banastre(1754–1833)

Colonel Lord William Cathcart, soon came to be known as Tarleton’s Green Horse because of the green jackets worn by the troopers. On August 11, 1778, Tarleton was brevetted a major in the British Army, and during the summer of 1778 and all of 1779, he was the legion’s acting commandant as it skirmished with American troops around New York City. In late December 1779, Tarleton sailed with Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton’s army for Charles Town, in command of the Legion cavalry of 150 men, as the British began their Southern campaign. Tarleton skirmished with American cavalry around Charles Town during March–May 1780. After Charles Town surrendered on May 12, Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis took command of the army in South Carolina and ordered Tarleton to advance into the South Carolina countryside. At Waxhaws, on May 29, Tarleton attacked Colonel Abraham Buford’s force of 380 Continentals, slaughtering 113, wounding 150 more, and taking 53 prisoners. From that point on, Americans despised him as a war criminal. Tarleton fought in the Battle of Camden (August 16, 1780), and two days later, at Fishing Creek, he defeated Brigadier General Thomas Sumter’s 700 militiamen. On November 20, at Blackstock’s Plantation, Tarleton again put Sumter to rout, but not before suffering heavy casualties. On January 17, 1781, with an independent command of 1,100 men, Tarleton fought a pitched battle with Brigadier General Daniel Morgan’s 2,000 Continental soldiers and

British Army officer Banastre Tarleton was born on August 21, 1754, in Liverpool, England. The son of a wealthy merchant, he attended University College, Oxford, from 1771 to 1773, then studied law at the Middle Temple until 1775. During this time, he gambled away a fortune of £5,000. On April 20, 1775, his mother purchased for him a commission as a cornet in the 1st King’s Dragoon Guards. He sailed from Portsmouth on December 26, 1775, having volunteered for service in America. During June 1776, Tarleton took part in Major General Henry Clinton’s abortive effort to capture Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, then fought in the battles around New York City and in the pursuit of General George Washington’s Continental Army across New Jersey. Tarleton led the patrol that captured Major General Charles Lee, second-in-command of the American army, at Basking Ridge, New Jersey, on December 13, 1776. Promoted to captain in America and given command of the 16th Light Dragoons, Tarleton fought in all the major battles of the Philadelphia campaign beginning in July 1777. After spending the winter of 1777–1778 in Philadelphia, he was promoted to permanent captain in the Dragoon Guards on June 13, 1778. He took part in the Battle of Monmouth (June 28), and on August 1, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel in America and made second-incommand of the newly organized British Legion. This cavalry unit, commanded by 219

220 | Treaty of Paris

militiamen at Cowpens, in upper South Carolina. Rashly ordering his soldiers into a head-on charge, Tarleton and his troops were shocked by unanticipated lethal fire. They were even more surprised when Morgan closed on Tarleton’s flanks in a classic double envelopment. Tarleton barely escaped capture, and his detachment suffered appalling casualties of 110 killed, 200 wounded, and 527 captured. The American losses were only 12 men killed and 60 wounded. Chastened but not cowed, Tarleton reorganized the legion, and in February and March 1781, he fought numerous skirmishes with American cavalrymen who opposed Cornwallis’s advance into North Carolina. On March 15, in the Battle of Guilford Courthouse, Tarleton was at first heavily engaged in an attack on an American advanced post, then he took part in a successful assault on the American left wing. Wounded twice in the right hand, he lost two fingers to amputation. Cornwallis praised him highly for his role in the battle and for other services. After Guilford Courthouse, Tarleton marched with Cornwallis into Virginia, seeking to seize rebel supplies and disrupt lines of communication southward. On June 4, 1781, he led a spectacular raid on Charlottesville that almost captured Governor Thomas Jefferson and did snare a number of members of the Virginia Assembly that was meeting there. Promoted on June 15, 1781, to lieutenant colonel of the 79th Regiment, Tarleton took part in the Battle of Green Spring on July 6. Three days later, he set out on another spectacular raid through Southside Virginia before returning to Cornwallis’s army on July 24. During the Siege of Yorktown (September 28–October 19, 1781), his unit was assigned to hold Gloucester Point, on the north bank of the York River, and surrendered with the rest of Cornwallis’s army.

Many Americans wanted to hang Tarleton, but French officers protected him. He left for England on parole, but his ship was captured by a French privateer. He had to pay a ransom of 400 guineas for his release. Finally arriving in London on January 18, 1782, Tarleton was welcomed as a war hero and given a private audience with King George III. Appointed lieutenant colonel of light dragoons on December 25, Tarleton went on half pay on October 24, 1783. In subsequent years, he served off and on in Parliament but was more interested in pleasure than politics. He was promoted to colonel in 1780, major general in 1794, lieutenant general in 1801, and general in 1812. Created a baronet in 1815, he was knighted in 1820. Tarleton died at Lancaster, England, on January 15, 1833. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Bass, Robert D. The Green Dragoon: The Lives of Banastre Tarleton and Mary Robinson. New York: Holt, 1957. Pancake, John S. This Destructive War: The British Campaign for the Carolinas, 1780– 1782. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1985. Tarleton, Banastre. History of the Campaigns of 1780 and 1781, in the Southern Provinces of North America. 1787. Reprint, New York: New York Times, 1968. Weigley, Russell F. The Partisan War: The South Carolina Campaign of 1780–1782. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1970.

Treaty of Paris(1783) The Treaty of Paris formally ended the American War of Independence between the United States and Great Britain. In 1780, Britain’s war to retain possession of the



rebelling American colonies was not going well. France had entered the conflict in 1778 and Spain a year later, drawing British resources away from the struggle in mainland North America. Britain’s strategy of suppressing high seas trade between the neutral countries of Russia, the Dutch Republic, Denmark, and Sweden, on the one hand, and the belligerent countries of France, Spain, and America, on the other, put Britain on a collision course with the neutral countries. On January 16, 1780, in the Battle of Cape St. Vincent, a British fleet under Vice Admiral Sir George Brydges Rodney defeated the Spanish fleet of Don Juan de Làngara and broke a Spanish siege of Gibraltar. But after that victory, almost all of Britain’s war news was gloomy. On February 28, 1780, Empress Catherine II of Russia proposed the formation of the League of Armed Neutrality to compel the Royal Navy to pay attention to neutral rights on the high seas. Sweden and Denmark quickly joined the league, and the Dutch appeared poised to do so. To forestall this possibility, Britain declared war on the Dutch Republic on December 20, 1780, and the Americans quickly began successful negotiations for recognition and support from the new belligerent. On May 9, 1781, Bernardo de Gàlvez, the Spanish governor of Louisiana, seized British West Florida. A year later, Gàlvez captured New Providence, in the Bahamas, and threatened to seize Jamaica. Meanwhile, the French captured Tobago and St. Christopher in the West Indies. Britain’s naval war there was faltering, but more problematic for British fortunes, Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown, Virginia, on October 19, 1781. In the face of these military and diplomatic setbacks, Parliament voted on

Treaty of Paris | 221

February 27, 1782, to end offensive warfare in North America, and on March 20, Prime Minister Lord Frederick North resigned. He was replaced as prime minister by Charles Watson-Wentworth, 2nd Marquis of Rockingham, who compelled a reluctant King George III to acquiesce to the idea of American independence. Immediately, Rockingham dispatched Richard Oswald to Paris to negotiate with America’s peace commissioners, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and John Jay, who had been appointed by Congress the year before. Oswald and the Americans quickly ran into difficulties because Oswald insisted on negotiating with “colonists” and refused to cede Canada to the new country.

The signature page of the Treaty of Paris of September 3, 1783, between Great Britain and the United States, which formally ended the Revolutionary War. (National Archives)

222 | Treaty of Paris

Rockingham died on July 1, 1782, and was replaced by William Petty Fitzmaurice, 2nd Earl of Shelburne, who adopted a more generous attitude. Shelburne was somewhat impeded in the negotiations by the fact that Britain had recently made gains in the war, and his cabinet was concerned that he was being too lenient with the Americans. But Shelburne countered that he intended to use the threat of a separate peace with the United States as a means to gain leverage with the French. Hence, negotiations were completed with some dispatch, and on November 30, 1782, Franklin, Adams, and Jay endorsed preliminary articles of peace, which later became the final treaty. The most important article was Britain’s acknowledgment that the United States (previously the 13 British colonies) were free, sovereign, and independent entities. Franklin could not convince Oswald to cede Canada, but he did achieve generous boundaries: all territory east of the Mississippi River, except East and West Florida, up to the Canadian border. Adams insisted on and got the right of access for U.S. fishermen to the Grand Banks, off the coast of Newfoundland, and in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Although not included in the treaty, Shelburne agreed to grant America trade reciprocity with Britain. For the British, the preliminary accord was less generous. Oswald insisted that Americans must return confiscated Loyalist property but had to settle for the commissioners’ promise that Congress would recommend such a measure to the individual states and make no further confiscations. Also, the commissioners promised Oswald that British creditors would not be interfered with in the collection of debts owed to them before the war. All prisoners of war on both sides were to be released, and all American property, including slaves, was to

be left unmolested as the British Army withdrew from America. Technically, the preliminary treaty violated America’s promise to France in 1778 that neither party would make a separate peace with Britain, but the commissioners argued that they and Oswald had agreed that the treaty would not go into effect until a general peace was declared in Europe. Negotiations toward such a general peace had begun in Paris in the fall of 1782. Representatives from Britain, Spain, and France were in attendance, with the Netherlands, still at war with Britain, not taking part. On January 20, 1783, the negotiators agreed to a truce between the warring countries and signed preliminary articles of peace. But Shelburne’s handling of the American and European peace negotiations was attacked in Parliament, and he resigned on February 24, to be replaced by the coalition government of Charles James Fox and Lord Frederick North. The new ministry was much less friendly toward America and immediately truncated Shelburne’s generous trade policies with the new country. Nevertheless, the Treaty of Versailles became permanent on September 3, as did the Treaty of Paris between the United States and Britain. British and American ratifications of the treaty were exchanged on May 12, 1784, thus formally ending the American War of Independence. Britain and the Netherlands signed a separate accord eight days later. The Fox-North frostiness in relations with the United States prevailed for more than 30 years. In 1785, John Adams was appointed the first minister to the Court of St. James’s, only to receive an unfriendly reception from the king and court. For eight years, Britain refused to even send a minister to the United States while it intrigued to annex Vermont to Canada. Using the failure of the American states to make good on



promises to return Loyalist property and pay prewar debts, Britain retained its forts in the Northwest Territory and encouraged Indians to resist American westward expansion. The Jay Treaty of 1794 ameliorated some of these difficulties, but it was not until the end of the War of 1812 that the two countries began to warm toward each other. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Fitzmaurice, Lord Edmond. Life of William, Earl of Shelburne. Vol. 3. London: Macmillan, 1876. Hoffman, Ronald, and Peter J. Albert, eds. Peace and the Peacemakers: The Treaty of 1783. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1986. Morris, Richard B. The Peacemakers; The Great Powers and American Independence. New York: Harper and Row, 1965. Shockley, Andrew. Britain and France at the Birth of America: The European Powers and the Peace Negotiations of 1782–1783. Exeter, UK: University of Exeter Press, 2001.

Trenton, New Jersey, Battle of (December 26, 1776) The first military campaign of Continental Army commander general George Washington ended in near disaster. In July 1776, General Sir William Howe, the British commander in chief, at the head of 32,000 British and German troops (the largest expeditionary force in British history until the twentieth century), landed in New York and proceeded to drive Washington’s troops from Long Island and Manhattan. Washington suffered one defeat after another; his men often simply broke and ran. Washington then left an isolated garrison at Fort Washington on the Manhattan side of the

Trenton, New Jersey, Battle of | 223

Hudson River, and in mid-November, supported by ships in the Hudson, British forces cut it off and captured it, taking 3,000 prisoners, 100 cannon, and a huge quantity of munitions. The same thing almost happened a few days later to the colonials at Fort Lee, across the Hudson in New Jersey. Washington fled to the interior, and Howe pursued in dilatory fashion, ignoring the Hudson to go after the Continental Army. But Washington got away, his army safely behind the Delaware River. On December 13, 1776, British forces caught up with Major General Charles Lee, who had rejected Washington’s orders to join him. The British captured Lee and some of his 4,000 men near Morristown, New Jersey. The British then went into winter quarters, their forces covered by a line of outposts. The most important was located at Trenton, New Jersey, and held by Colonel Johann Rall’s Hessian mercenaries. What was left of Washington’s force was deployed across the Delaware River from Trenton. Washington’s position was critical. Smallpox ravaged his force, and half of his 10,000 men were sick. To make matters worse, enlistments for most would expire in a few days, at the end of the year. Washington decided to risk everything and mount a surprise attack on Trenton. Everything depended on getting the men across the icy Delaware at night to achieve surprise. Crossings by 5,500 men, horses, and artillery were to occur at three separate locations, with the forces converging on Trenton. If circumstances allowed, they could then advance on the British posts at Princeton and New Brunswick. The attempt was planned for Christmas night, December 25. The crossing was to start at 5:00 p.m., with the attack at Trenton scheduled for 5:00 a.m. the next day.

224 | Trenton, New Jersey, Battle of

However, weather conditions were terrible, and the troops were slow to reach their assembly areas. As a consequence, the men began loading an hour later than planned. Shallow-draft wooden Durham boats, 40–60 feet long by 8 feet wide, transported the men across the river. They were the perfect craft for such an operation, as they had a keel and bow at each end. Four men, two to a side, used setting poles to push off the bottom and move the boats, which also had a mast and two sails. Horses and artillery went across in Delaware River ferries. All did not go smoothly. A storm swept through, and of the three crossings, only the major one at McKonkey’s Ferry under Washington with 2,400 men occurred in time for the planned attack. That force was divided into two corps under Major Generals John Sullivan and Nathanael Greene. Colonel Henry Knox commanded the 18 pieces of artillery. Conditions were horrible. The men had to contend with not only the dark but also wind, rain, sleet, snow, and chunks of ice in the Delaware. The password for the operation, “Liberty or Death,” reflected its desperate nature. Washington had planned for the crossing to be complete by midnight, but the last man was not across until after 3:00 a.m. It was nearly 4:00 a.m. before the army formed and began to move. Washington’s men were poorly clad for such an operation; some actually had no shoes and wrapped their feet in rags. When the army had formed, the men thus marched the nine miles to Trenton. Washington was determined that the attack would succeed. When Sullivan informed him that the storm had wet the muskets, making them unfit for service, he replied, “Tell General Sullivan to use the bayonet. I am resolved to take Trenton.”

Washington’s will more than anything kept the men going. On nearing Trenton, Washington split his force into the two corps to follow two different roads for a converging attack on the British outpost. The attack began at 8:00 a.m., with the two columns opening fire within 8 minutes of one another. The battle lasted some 90 minutes. The Hessian garrison consisted of three regiments, 50 Hessian jägers, and 20 light dragoons, about 1,600 men in all, along with six 3-pounder guns. Continental Army forces soon drove the Hessians back. Artillery played a major role, and here Washington enjoyed an advantage of three to one, with his guns deployed to fire down the streets of the town. The battle itself was a confused melee of men fighting in small groups or singly. Rall rallied his men, intending a bayonet charge down Queen Street, but he was soon mortally wounded. The Hessians were cut down by individual Americans with muskets and rifles and by artillery fire. The Hessian losses were 22 killed and 92 wounded. A total of 948 were captured. The remaining Hessians would also have been taken had the other columns gotten into position in time. The Continentals also secured a considerable quantity of arms and booty. The Americans lost only 2 men, frozen to death, and 5 wounded. With little food or rest for 36 hours, Washington’s men needed relief, and he was thus forced to suspend operations. On December 27, the Continentals were back across the Delaware. Washington followed up Trenton with another foray across the Delaware and a victory at Princeton on January 3, 1777. These two small Continental victories changed the entire campaign. Washington called Trenton “a glorious day for our



country,” and in London, the British minister for the colonies, Lord George Germain, exclaimed, “All our hopes were blasted by the unhappy affair at Trenton.” Trenton helped end the Continentals’ fear of the Hessian troops. More important, the battles at Trenton and Princeton added immensely to Washington’s prestige, which had been at a low point a month before, establishing his reputation as a general and a leader of men. They also restored Continental morale, which had been at its lowest point since the start of the war. In two weeks, Washington had snatched victory out of the jaws of

Trenton, New Jersey, Battle of | 225

death and fanned the dying embers of American independence into flame again. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Fischer, David Hackett. Washington’s Crossing. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. Ketchum, Richard M. The Winter Soldiers: The Battles for Trenton and Princeton. New York: Henry Holt, 1999. McPhillips, Martin. The Battle of Trenton. Parsippany, NJ: Silver Burdett, 1984. Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. Vol. 1. New York: Macmillan, 1952.

V Valcour Island, Battle of (October 11, 1776)

Today, it is displayed in the Smithsonian Institution, touted as the oldest U.S. Navy (actually army) warship in existence. The Philadelphia was an open boat 53 feet in length. It had a single mast with a square course and topsail but was basically a rowing boat propelled by its crew of 45 men using long oars known as sweeps. It carried one 12-pounder on a slide mount at the bow and two 9-pounders on carriage mounts to fire over the rails. It was also armed with light man-killing swivel guns mounted on the ship’s rails. The British had both larger vessels and more guns on Lake Champlain. What they did not have was time. Winter would bring their operations to a halt because their invasion route on the lake would freeze over. By early October, however, the fleet of Major General Sir Guy Carleton, the governor of Quebec, was ready to move. The resulting engagements between the British and Americans began at Valcour Island, about 50 miles north of Fort Ticonderoga, on October 11, 1776. Arnold’s 800 men had 15 warships: 2 schooners, 1 sloop, 4 galleys, and 8 gondolas, with a combined cannon throw weight of 703 pounds. Because he knew from intelligence reports that his own force was inferior to that of the British, Arnold selected the narrow, rocky waters between the western shore of Lake Champlain and Valcour Island for a fight. This caused the British difficulty in bringing their superior firepower to bear and also minimized problems for his relatively untrained crews. Some of Arnold’s captains wanted to fight in open waters so they could

Control of Lake Champlain was vital for the Americans in supplying their efforts to conquer Canada during the American Revolutionary War. The lake was also crucial for the British plan to separate New England from the other rebellious colonies. Both sides had used row galleys and other small craft on the lake during the American winter campaign of 1775–1776. Even after the American withdrawal from Canada, the Continental Congress had ordered Major General Philip Schuyler to hold northern New York and authorized him to build “gallies and armed vessels” to secure Lake Champlain and Lake George. Continental Army brigadier general Benedict Arnold had charge of construction, and neighboring colonies sent materials and shipwrights. Arnold preferred row galleys and hoped to meet the British with eight of these, each armed with two heavy 24-pounders and two 18-pounders. However, only four were completed in time to take part in the battle. Each was more than 72 feet in length with two masts and a lateen rig. Crew complement was 80 men. Most mounted two 12- or 18-pounders in the bow, two 12-pounders (along with possibly two 2-pounders) in the stern, and four 6-pounders in broadside. All carried smaller man-killing weapons known as swivels on their rails. As with all Lake Champlain squadron vessels, precise armament cannot be verified. In 1935, one of Arnold’s smaller ships, the gondola Philadelphia, was raised. 227

228 | Valley Forge, Pennsylvania

withdraw to Fort Crown Point if necessary, but Arnold believed that the purpose of the flotilla was to delay a British advance on Crown Point and Ticonderoga. He placed his vessels at anchor in a crescent shape so that the British would have to tack into position to engage them. The commander of the British squadron, Lieutenant Thomas Pringle, had some 25 warships, many of them mounting heavier guns than those available to Arnold. Pringle’s smaller vessels alone were nearly a match for all those of the Americans. The British warships were served by 667 trained Royal Navy seamen and 1,000 soldiers; their guns had a combined throw weight of 1,300 pounds. On October 11, Pringle’s vessels pounded the Americans for six hours. The Americans lost 1 schooner and 1 gondola, and 3 other vessels were badly damaged. The Americans also used up most of their ammunition. During the night, Arnold’s remaining 13 vessels slipped past the British in an effort to escape and reach Fort Ticonderoga. However, the wind changed and blew from the south, forcing the Americans to resort to their sweeps. For a day, the Americans kept ahead of the pursuing British, but their damaged and leaking boats enabled the enemy to catch up with them. Thus, a second engagement was fought on October 13, north of Crown Point. One American galley struck to the British, and Arnold beached and set afire another galley and 4 gondolas. Eleven of 15 Patriot vessels had been either captured or sunk, and the Americans losses in the two engagements were about 80 men killed or wounded. Perhaps 120 were captured. The others escaped ashore and got to Crown Point on foot, just ahead of pursuing Indians allied with the British. British losses were 40 killed or wounded and 3 small vessels sunk.

Although a tactical defeat for the Americans, these two small battles on Lake Champlain were also a strategic American victory. They ended any possibility of a linkup in 1776 between Carleton’s forces and those of General Sir William Howe in New York. Carleton, thinking it too late in the year to begin a land campaign, withdrew into Canada for the winter. If the British had taken Fort Ticonderoga at this time, their campaign in 1777 would have been easier and might have been a success. Instead, the British thrust southward a year later ended in surrender at Saratoga (October 17, 1777) and proved to be the turning point of the war. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Allen, Gardner W. A Naval History of the American Revolution. Vol. 1. Cambridge, MA: Houghton Mifflin, 1913. Chapelle, Howard I. The History of the American Sailing Navy: The Ships and Their Development. New York: Norton, 1949. Nelson, James L. Benedict Arnold’s Navy: The Ragtag Fleet That Lost the Battle of Lake Champlain but Won the American Revolution. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2006.

Valley Forge, Pennsylvania (December 19, 1777–June 19, 1778) Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, was the Continental Army’s encampment during the winter of 1777–1778. By December 1777, the American Revolutionary War was not going well for General George Washington, the commander in chief of the Continental Army, and the 10,000 half-starved men under his command. Since August, British soldiers under General Sir William Howe



had defeated them at Brandywine (September 11) and at Germantown (October 4). On September 26, Philadelphia had fallen to Howe’s army, and soon the Delaware River supply line would be open to him. When Washington’s system of army supply temporarily collapsed in October, he had withdrawn his troops to White Marsh, northwest of Philadelphia. In early December, Howe maneuvered against his entrenched lines but then returned to Philadelphia without initiating a battle. Washington briefly contemplated a winter campaign against the British, but his officers favored retirement into winter quarters. Hence, in mid-December, the commander in chief marched his army to Valley Forge, located on the west bank of the Schuylkill River, some 25 miles northwest of Philadelphia. On December 19, his poorly fed, ill-equipped Continentals, weary from hard battles and long marches, staggered into their new cantonment. Only one in three had shoes, and their clothing was in tatters. No provisions awaited them, for their supply system was again temporarily disrupted. Construction was immediately begun on the encampment’s defense lines, which were soon completed. Grounds for brigade encampments were laid out, and within three days, log huts began to appear for the troops. By early February 1778, some 2,000 huts had been built. These domiciles, although crude, were well chinked and provided protection from the elements. Snows during the winter were limited and not deep. More often than not, precipitation fell in the form of rain that turned the camp into a morass of mud. The snow was often so skimpy that the troops could not collect enough to provide drinking water. Alternating spells of cold and thawing made it impossible for the men to stay dry and

Valley Forge, Pennsylvania | 229

created perfect conditions for diseases to flourish. Typhus, typhoid, smallpox, dysentery, and pneumonia, complicated by malnutrition and exposure, had killed some 2,500 soldiers by the end of the winter. Food and other supplies were a perpetual problem for Washington’s men throughout the long winter. By January 1, 1778, the logistical departments were once more feeding the army, but in a hit-or-miss fashion. Soldiers received inadequate supplies of meat and bread, and many lived on fire cake, a mixture of water and flour hardened by heat from a fire. Sometimes there would be pepper pot soup, a broth of tripe and water flavored with black pepper. The bakery service, headed by Christopher Ludwick (Ludwig), sometimes supplied the men with fresh-baked bread. Clothing continued to be in short supply. After March 1778, the new quartermaster general, Major General Nathanael Greene, sent foragers out to purchase supplies from local farmers, but they had trouble getting the farmers to accept promissory notes for inflated paper currency. Washington angrily accused the citizenry of being unpatriotic, declaring on more than one occasion that the army was on the verge of dissolving or dispersing. In February 1778, a desperate Congress gave Washington authority to seize provisions and supplies that were otherwise unattainable. In addition to his other problems at Valley Forge, Washington had to contend with congressional politics. Congress, adjourned to York, Pennsylvania, after the British occupied Philadelphia, was riven, as always, with numerous factions and rivalries. Washington was already disgusted with the way in which the politicians addressed his enormous logistical problems and their seeming indifference to the fate of either him or his soldiers. Then he began to hear rumors that

230 | Valley Forge, Pennsylvania

the New Englanders and some others were attempting to supplant him as commander in chief, the so-called Conway Cabal. His supposed rival was Major General Horatio Gates, who had forced Lieutenant General John Burgoyne to surrender at Saratoga, New York, on October 17, 1777. The militarily successful Gates was to replace the militarily unsuccessful Washington, or so the commander in chief apparently came to believe. Congress was supposedly also creating a Board of War, with Gates as chairman, to remove from Washington’s hands a number of military planning and support functions. Although these rumors were baseless, Washington used them to successfully restore his authority and standing with the politicians by attacking and destroying Gates’s reputation. In this episode, the soldier Washington taught the politicians a political trick or two. On February 23, 1778, Friedrich von Steuben, a self-proclaimed German baron, arrived at Valley Forge. Recruited by Benjamin Franklin in Paris to bring order to America’s military establishment, Congress, upon Washington’s recommendation, commissioned him a major general and appointed him inspector general of the army. For all his pretenses, Steuben was an experienced military man with an almost innate sense of America’s social character. Although he did not speak English, he inscribed a drill manual in French, which Alexander Hamilton and Greene translated into English. The Prussian drill and maneuver techniques that Steuben shared with Continental soldiers were more advanced than those of other European armies, let alone the ragged American rebels. His aim was to reduce his shoeless charges to battlefield automatons, and he was remarkably successful.

Perhaps more important, Steuben taught the Americans an efficient way of firing and reloading their muskets and then drilled them in it until it became second nature. He also insisted that the Continentals, who were notoriously slovenly in camp, practice basic hygiene. He placed kitchens and latrines on opposite sides of the camp, with latrines draining away from the soldiers’ huts. This last was a novelty, for American soldiers had not before had latrines. On June 1, 1778, the British army in Philadelphia evacuated the city, marching across New Jersey toward New York City. The next day, Washington led the Continental Army out of Valley Forge and began trailing the enemy army. On June 28, 1778, at Monmouth, he attacked the British rear guard, and the newly trained American forces performed well. Valley Forge, which for years after its abandonment was just a bad memory for Americans, came in time to represent all that was good in their struggle for independence. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Bodle, Wayne K. The Valley Forge Winter: Civilians and Soldiers in War. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2002. Carp, E. Wayne. To Starve the Army at Pleasure: Continental Army Administration and American Political Culture, 1775– 1783. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1984. Jackson, John W. Valley Forge: Pinnacle of Courage. Gettysburg, PA: Thomas Publications, 1992. Trussell, John B. B. Birthplace of an Army: A Study of the Valley Forge Encampment. Harrisburg: Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, 1976.



Vimeur, Jean-Baptiste Donatien de, Comte de Rochambeau | 231

Vimeur, Jean-Baptiste Donatien de, Comte de Rochambeau (1725–1807) Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau, was a French Army officer and the commander of the French Expeditionary Force in America during the American Revolutionary War. He was born on July 1, 1725, in Vendôme, France. At first destined for the priesthood, Rochambeau was educated by Oratorian and Jesuit priests. But when his older brother died, he decided on a military career. In 1740, he spent a short time at the Officer’s Academy (later Saint-Cyr). On May 24, 1742, during the War of the Austrian Succession (1740– 1748), he entered a cavalry regiment, seeing service in Bohemia, Bavaria, and on the Rhine, and was wounded. In 1747, Rochambeau was promoted to colonel, and a year later, he took part in the Siege of Maastricht. He became governor of Vendôme in 1749. At the outbreak of the Seven Years’ War in 1756, he fought in the May 20, 1756, Battle of Minorca and was promoted to brigadier general. He also saw service in Germany during 1758. Rochambeau was promoted to major general in 1761, and after 1763, he devoted the next 15 years to improving French Army training. Appointed governor of Villefranche in 1776, he was given command of the advance guard of a French army preparing for an invasion of Britain that never occurred. On March 1, 1780, Rochambeau was promoted to lieutenant general and given command of a 5,500-man army destined for service in America. At first daunted by the idea of fighting in the American conflict, he eventually accepted the duty because of his sympathy for the rebels’ cause. He manfully struggled over the next two months with

organizing transports and dealing with myriad other details involved in preparing for such an expedition. On May 2, 1780, his army sailed from Brest, reaching Newport, Rhode Island, on July 11 with 700 sick soldiers. In the next few weeks, scores of them died. Pressed by Major General MarieJoseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, the personal envoy of General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, to immediately join the American army at White Plains, New York, and attack the British at New York City, Rochambeau explained that the Franco-American forces were too weak to attempt such a precipitous action. In his first meeting with Washington, at Hartford, Connecticut, on September 20–21, Rochambeau underscored these points, thus causing some coolness between the American general and himself. Meanwhile, he had to contend with widespread anti-French prejudices among the Americans, the product of centuries of hostility between the two peoples. He thus had to perform the double duties of general and diplomat in this hostile environment. For almost a year, Rochambeau’s army sat in Newport while American military prospects reached a nadir. The treason of Major General Benedict Arnold in September 1780, the melting away of the Continental Army as soldiers went home for the harvest, mutinies of Pennsylvania and New Jersey troops in January 1781, and British military successes in the South all boded ill for the American cause, and the French in Newport seemed to be doing nothing. In February and March 1781, Rochambeau sent limited spoiling expeditions to the Chesapeake, but without much effect on the war. Matters began to take on a brighter aspect on May 22, 1781, when Rochambeau met

232 | Vimeur, Jean-Baptiste Donatien de, Comte de Rochambeau

Washington at Wethersfield, Connecticut, and agreed to a joint American-French assault on New York City. Between June 9 and early August, in preparation for this event, he shifted French troops to American positions outside the city. Thereupon, he and Washington commenced siege operations. Matters took a remarkable turn on August 14, when Rochambeau received a letter from Rear Admiral François-Joseph-Paul, comte de Grasse-Tilly, informing him that the admiral was sailing from the Caribbean to Chesapeake Bay with 30 ships and 3,000 troops and would remain there until late October. Washington and Rochambeau realized that they had the opportunity to join forces in Virginia with a small army under Lafayette that was shadowing Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis’s army at Yorktown. They could squeeze Cornwallis between Franco-American land forces and de Grasse’s ships and compel his surrender. Within four days, Washington’s FrancoAmerican army was marching southward. Meanwhile, de Grasse had arrived in Chesapeake Bay in early August and reinforced Lafayette at Yorktown with his 3,000 troops. On September 5, in the Second Battle of the Chesapeake, de Grasse turned back a last-minute attempt by Rear Admiral Thomas Graves to rescue Cornwallis’s imperiled army. In late September, Washington, Rochambeau, and Lafayette began siege operations against Yorktown. Washington gave oversight of the siege to Rochambeau because of his previous experience with that type of warfare. Relentlessly, Rochambeau’s lines, classic in their eighteenth-century precision, closed in on Cornwallis until the British were forced to surrender on October 19.

After the Americans and French celebrated their victory, Rochambeau’s soldiers settled into an eight-month stay in Virginia while Washington marched back to New York. In July 1782, the French army also marched to New York and then to Boston. Rochambeau gave up command of his troops in December 1782, and they departed for the Caribbean. In early January 1783, he sailed for France, arriving on February 20 to a hero’s welcome. As a reward for his service in America, King Louis XVI appointed him governor of Picardy and Artois, and he settled into retirement on his estates near Vendôme. Although appalled at the violence and disorder of the French Revolution in 1789, Rochambeau returned to public service in 1791 when the king promoted him to the rank of marshal. A year later, he resigned his commission. In April 1794, he was arrested during the Reign of Terror and was imprisoned until October. Rochambeau then returned to his estates, where he lived quietly until his death on May 12, 1807, at Thoré-la-Rochette. Paul David Nelson

Further Reading Hattendorf, John B. Newport, the French Navy, and American Independence. Providence, RI: Redwood, 2004. Kennett, Lee B. The French Forces in America, 1780–1783. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1977. Rice, Howard C., and Anne S. K. Brown, eds. The American Campaigns of Rochambeau’s Army, 1780, 1781, 1782, 1783. 2 vols. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1972. Whitridge, Arnold. Rochambeau. New York: Macmillan, 1965.

W Washington, George(1732–1799) George Washington was the commander in chief of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War and the first president of the United States. Born in Westmoreland County, Virginia, on February 22, 1732, Washington was one of seven children of Augustine Washington, a wealthy farmer. Following the death of his father in 1743, young George came under the guardianship of his older brother Lawrence. Washington had little formal education. His mother blocked his plans to join the Royal Navy, so he became a surveyor in Culpepper County in 1749, spending several years surveying Virginia’s western lands. With Lawrence’s assistance, George received an appointment as a major in the Virginia Militia in 1752. Following Lawrence’s death in July 1752 and that of Lawrence’s daughter in September, George inherited the family estate of Mount Vernon. Washington became involved in the struggle between the British and French for supremacy in North America when he volunteered to investigate reports of French incursions into the Ohio River valley during October 1753–January 1754. When the lieutenant governor of Virginia, Robert Dinwiddie, ordered the formation of a regiment to oppose the French in the west in the spring of 1754, Washington received a commission as lieutenant colonel of militia and was appointed second-in-command. On the death of the colonel in May, Washington assumed command and led 160 men across the Alleghenies. His preemptive attack on

Iconic Gilbert Stuart painting of George Washington. The “indispensable man,” Washington commanded the Continental Army (1775–1783) during the Revolutionary War and was also the first president of the United States (1789–1797). (National Gallery of Art)

the French at Great Meadows on May 28 in effect began the French and Indian War (1754–1763). The French then sought out Washington’s force and obliged it to surrender at hastily constructed Fort Necessity on July 4. Allowed to return home with his men, Washington learned that the Virginia Militia would be broken into independent companies. Facing the prospect of reduction in rank to captain, he resigned his commission 233

234 | Washington, George

in October 1754. In the spring of 1755, Washington volunteered to accompany British major general Edward Braddock as aide-de-camp without rank on the latter’s ill-fated expedition against French Fort Duquesne, near present-day Pittsburgh. The British met disaster in the Battle of the Monongahela on July 9, where Washington exhibited both leadership and personal courage and helped bring the remnants of Braddock’s force to safety. Refusing to blame Braddock and winning wide public approval for his own role in the fiasco, in August 1755, Washington accepted command of the Virginia regiment as a full colonel, training the men and supervising the construction and manning of a number of western frontier forts, which then turned back several native raids in 1756 and 1757. Washington established an excellent reputation, leading by example and manifesting concern for the welfare of his men. Washington failed in his attempts to secure incorporation of the Virginia regiment into the British Army, but he commanded a brigade of some 700 provincial troops as part of Brigadier General John Forbes’s successful expedition against Fort Duquesne during July–November 1758, gaining valuable command experience in the process but failing in his bid to secure a commission in the British Army. Resigning his military post in December 1758, Washington married wealthy widow Martha Custis and was elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses. He also represented Virginia at the First and Second Continental Congresses in Philadelphia in 1774 and 1775. With the beginning of the American Revolutionary War in April 1775, Washington lobbied for military command. Because he was native-born, had some military experience, and was from the most

wealthy and populous colony of Virginia, on June 15, Congress named Washington the commander in chief of the newly created Army of the United Colonies (Continental Army). He arrived at Cambridge, Massachusetts, on July 2 and assumed command of the forces besieging Boston the next day. Washington’s formidable leadership skills, his recognition of the primacy of civil authority in Congress, his reputation for honesty, and his ability to pick able subordinates all proved to be valuable assets. Merely keeping the Continental Army together was a considerable achievement. Congress constantly interfered in military matters, including the promotion and assignment of officers. Washington proved to be an astute judge of character and a diplomat of the first order. The size of the Continental Army fluctuated wildly, and state militia forces were poorly trained and unreliable. Given the immense problems of supply, it is amazing that Washington was able to even keep the army together. He did more than that. Working hard to train the army with the critical assistance of Friedrich von Steuben, within three years, Washington would develop a small but well-disciplined force capable of meeting the British on equal terms in selective battles. Although Washington was successful in causing the British to evacuate Boston on March 17, 1776, the resulting New York campaign was a near disaster that was fueled in part by his mistakes. Following his defeat in the Battle of Brooklyn (August 27), his evacuation of Long Island on the night of August 29–30 was masterful. Delaying actions at Harlem Heights on September 16 and White Plains on October 28 were successful, but he made a terrible mistake in leaving a large garrison on Manhattan Island at Fort Washington, which the



British then cut off and captured on November 16. Forced to withdraw across New Jersey, Washington escaped across the Delaware River into Pennsylvania, where with the enlistments of much of the army about to expire, he risked everything in a daring raid on the British outpost at Trenton and was successful on December 26. He then went on to defeat the British at Princeton on January 3, 1777. These two victories restored confidence both in the Patriot cause and in Washington as its military leader. Although he actively sought the advice of his subordinates and usually heeded it, Washington was an aggressive commander when opportunities arose. Defeated before Philadelphia at Brandywine Creek on September 11, 1777, he mounted a surprise attack on the British camp outside of Philadelphia at Germantown on October 4, which only failed because of inept subordinates and an overly complex plan. At the same time, recognizing an important opportu­ nity, Washington sent units north to assist in the capture of an entire invading British army under Lieutenant General John Burgoyne at Saratoga, New York, on October 17. Washington held his army together in the suffering of the winter encampment at Valley Forge during 1777–1778 and then attacked the British on their withdrawal from Philadelphia at Monmouth Court House on June 28, 1778, where his inept subordinate Major General Charles Lee threw away a splendid chance for victory. Informed of the American victory at Saratoga, the French signed a formal treaty of alliance in February 1778 and were at war with Britain that June. Washington was able to take advantage of the arrival in North American waters of a powerful French fleet under Admiral FrançoisJoseph-Paul, comte de Grasse-Tilly. Marching south from New York state with French

Washington, George | 235

land forces under Lieutenant General JeanBaptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau, Washington laid siege to Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis’s British army at Yorktown, Virginia. After a monthlong siege (September 26– October 19, 1781), Cornwallis was forced to surrender. This defeat brought the downfall of the ministry in London and a new policy on the part of the British government of cutting its losses, leading to the end of the war in the Treaty of Paris of September 3, 1783. Washington quelled a potential mutiny among his officers over pay at Newburgh, New York, during February–March 1783, and then resigned his commission in December to return to his beloved Mount Vernon. Washington was selected as president of the convention that produced the U.S. Constitution in May 1787, and although he did not take an active role in the deliberations or debates, his mere presence lent considerable gravitas to the proceedings and helped keep the delegates focused on the most pressing issues of the nascent government. His support also aided in ratification of the new U.S. Constitution. Washington was unanimously elected the first president of the United States by the electoral college, and to this day, he remains the only president to be elected with 100 percent of the vote. He was inaugurated in New York City, the temporary capital of the United States, on April 30, 1789. The former general proved to be an able administrator and an astute delegator of responsibility. This included empowering Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton to take control of the nation’s chaotic financial situation, which resulted in sound fiscal policies designed to pay down the staggering debts owed by the federal and state governments, the establishment of the

236 | Washington, George

First Bank of the United States (1791), the imposition of tariffs on imported products, the establishment of public credit, and the creation of the first internal tax in U.S. history—the so-called Whiskey Tax of 1791. Many of Hamilton’s policies proved controversial and helped foster the formation of competing political factions, which Washington himself assiduously avoided. Nevertheless, the Washington administration’s fiscal and economic policies proved successful in the long term and helped put the new nation on much firmer footing. With the passage of the Residence Act of 1790, Washington became largely responsible for the construction of the new federal capital. He helped select the site and was actively involved in the planning and early construction phases of some of the most iconic U.S. buildings. The new District of Columbia was renamed Washington, DC, in Washington’s honor. In the arena of foreign affairs, Washington fashioned a pragmatic yet incisive policy that generally benefited the United States, which at the time had a minuscule military presence and therefore did not yet carry much clout with the major powers. When fighting broke out between France and Great Britain, he strove to keep the country neutral. The Jay Treaty of 1794 eased tensions between the Americans and British and settled some long-standing issues, including the British abandonment of outposts in the Old Northwest Territory. It also expanded U.S. trade in the British West Indies and established firm borders between the United States and Britishcontrolled Canada. Granted the rank of lieutenant general by Congress, Washington took field command of militia forces during the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794, which was a revolt against the whiskey tax and centered in western

Pennsylvania. His leadership and calls for restraint proved to be invaluable in ending the crisis with minimal losses. Meanwhile, Washington waged war against many of the tribes in the Old Northwest Territory, which had been engaged in Little Turtle’s War since 1785. Washington authorized three expeditions to quash the Indian uprising. The first two, in 1790 and 1791, ended in spectacular failures; however, Major General Anthony Wayne’s campaign, which culminated in the decisive Battle of Fallen Timbers (August 20, 1794), was a great success. Little Turtle’s War was officially ended with the Treaty of Fort Greenville (1795), which among other things ceded two-thirds of Ohio to the U.S. government. Toward other tribes, Washington’s policy was somewhat more benevolent. He hoped to coax Native Americans into adopting white European ways so they would no longer have a reason to war against Americans and could gradually assimilate to American life. Washington reluctantly ran for a second term in office. In 1794, he signed the Naval Act into law, creating the U.S. Navy. He was fully cognizant that the United States needed a credible naval presence to protect its shipping from both British and French depredations but also from the Barbary pirates, who were exacting a heavy toll on American shipping in the southern Mediterranean. Meanwhile, the 1795 Treaty of San Lorenzo (Pinckney’s Treaty) drew firm borders between the United States and Spanish territories in North America and also ensured American navigation rights on the Mississippi River. Refusing to stand for a third term, Washington retired to his estate at Mount Vernon, Virginia, in 1797. Before leaving office, however, he offered a farewell address, which was and remains to this day one of



the most thoughtful statements on American society ever written. In it, Washington stressed the importance of national unity, the supremacy of the Constitution, and the malevolent nature of political parties. He also cautioned against allowing foreign powers to have undue influence on the country’s internal affairs and plainly warned that the nation should steer clear of European machinations and entangling foreign alliances. He also stressed the “dispositions and habits” of “religion and morality” as “indispensable supports” of “political prosperity.” Washington’s admonitions about political parties had little effect, as the two major political parties—the Federalists and Democratic-Republicans—had already taken shape during his presidency. But successive governments heeded his calls for no permanent foreign alliances for some 150 years, until the formation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949. Washington died at Mount Vernon on December 14, 1799. Although he had to acquire much of his military and governmental training on the job, he was truly one of the greatest generals and presidents in American history. Washington was so invaluable to the American cause that it is difficult to imagine success without him. One biographer calls him the “Indispensable Man.” More than military and organizational skills, George Washington brought the priceless gift of character. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Ellis, Joseph J. His Excellency: George Washington. New York: Knopf, 2004. Flexner, James T. George Washington in the American Revolution, 1775–1783. Boston: Little, Brown, 1968. Freeman, Douglas Southall. Washington: An Abridgement in One Volume. Edited by

Wayne, Anthony | 237 Richard Harwell. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1995. Higgenbotham, Donald. George Washington and the American Military Tradition. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1985 Lengel, Edward G. General George Washington: A Military Life. New York: Random House, 2005. Middlekauff, Robert. Washington’s Revolution: The Making of America’s First Leader. New York: Knopf, 2015.

Wayne, Anthony(1745–1796) Anthony Wayne was a Continental Army officer and commander of the Legion of the United States. He was born on the family estate in Waynesborough, Chester County, Pennsylvania, on January 1, 1745, and was educated at the Academy in Philadelphia but left school in 1763 to become a surveyor. He worked for a time as the agent and then superintendent of a land company in Nova Scotia, but it failed. He returned home to work as a surveyor and to help run his father’s tanning business. Active in politics by 1770, Wayne won election to the Pennsylvania Assembly in 1774, but he resigned the next year upon the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War to raise a volunteer militia regiment. Although he had no formal military training, on January 3, 1776, Wayne secured a commission as colonel of the 4th Pennsylvania Regiment. Ordered to take part in the Canada expedition, he was wounded in the Battle of Trois-Rivières on June 8, 1776. His action in covering the retreat of U.S. forces from Canada won him promotion to brigadier general on February 21, 1777; he was then posted to Morristown, New Jersey. Wayne again distinguished himself in fighting in the Battle of Brandywine

238 | Wayne, Anthony

(September 11, 1777) when his division at Chadds Ford held for three hours against a Hessian assault. Wayne was conspicuous for his bravery in the retreat. He then led harassing attacks on the British as they advanced on Philadelphia, but his men were taken by surprise in their camp at Paoli in a daring British night attack led by Major General Sir Charles Grey on September 20–21, 1777, that led to British soldiers bayoneting his men (the so-called Paoli Massacre) and 100 American casualties. Wayne requested a court-martial. It cleared him of any misconduct but found that he had erred in his tactical dispositions. Wayne earned praise for his conduct in the Battle of Germantown on October 4, 1777, even though in the confusion of that fight his men fired on other American soldiers. He spent the winter at Valley Forge and suffered there with his men while criticizing Congress for neglect. In February 1778, he led a monthlong foraging expedition into New Jersey, escaping a British effort to entrap him. Wayne also performed well in the Battle of Monmouth of June 28, 1778, leading the initial attack and then ably defending against the British counterattack, giving Continental Army commander general George Washington time to reorganize the troops. Given command of the corps of light infantry, Wayne carefully planned and trained his men. He then led a brilliant bayonet attack that carried the British position at Stony Point, New York, on July 16, 1779, a daring action that won him the nickname “Mad Anthony.” Wayne’s command was relatively inactive during the remainder of 1779, but his raid on Bull’s Ferry, New Jersey, on July 20–21, 1780, was a failure. His men spent the winter of 1780–1781 at Morristown,

where they suffered terribly from lack of provisions. In January 1781, Wayne was the principal figure in defusing a mutiny of the Pennsylvania Line. In March 1781, he was ordered to Virginia but refused to go until his men were properly equipped. In May 1781, Wayne and his men joined Major General Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, in harassing British forces in eastern Virginia under Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis. Always aggressive, Wayne ignored Lafayette’s warning and stumbled into a trap laid by Cornwallis at Green Spring, Virginia, on July 6. Wayne was fortunate to be able to extricate his command in the darkness. He was present at the Siege of Yorktown (September 28–October 19, 1781) but, recovering from a wound, saw little action. In January 1782, Wayne joined Major General Nathanael Greene, who commanded Continental Army forces in the South. Wayne then led an independent command in Georgia but encountered difficulties fighting the British, Loyalist forces, and hostile Creeks and Choctaws. His small force proved insufficient to take Savannah, his chief goal, but the British evacuated Georgia in July 1782. At the end of the war, in October 1783, Wayne was brevetted a major general. After the war, Wayne retired to farm in Pennsylvania. He was elected to the Pennsylvania Assembly in 1784. A staunch nationalist, he was elected to the state convention that ratified the U.S. Constitution. In 1785, he relocated to Georgia to manage landholdings the state had awarded him for his services there in 1782. A poor businessman, he went into debt in efforts to increase productivity of his rice crop. Pressed by

Women | 239

creditors, Wayne remained in Georgia to avoid legal proceedings in Pennsylvania. It was not until 1791 that he was free of major debt. Unsuccessful in securing election to the U.S. Senate from Georgia in 1788, he won election to the U.S. Congress from that state in 1791, but the election was subsequently declared invalid because of voting irregularities. In April 1792, following two disastrous expeditions against Native Americans of the Northwest by Brigadier General Josiah Harmar and the governor of the Northwest Territory, Arthur St. Clair, President George Washington recalled Wayne as a major general to command the newly authorized 5,000man Legion of the United States. Wayne took advantage of extended negotiations with the Indians to establish a camp at Legionville in western Pennsylvania and properly train the army. He stressed drill, proper sanitation, field fortifications, and marksmanship. Finally, in the summer of 1794, Wayne led the army, supported by Kentucky militia, west into the Ohio Territory. In the Battle of Fallen Timbers, on August 20, 1794, he defeated Native American forces led by Shawnee chief Blue Jacket. This victory broke the power of the Native Americans in the eastern part of the Old Northwest and did much to restore the prestige of the U.S. Army. As a result, Wayne is often called the father of the new U.S. regular army. A year later, he concluded the Treaty of Greenville with the Native Americans. In 1796, Wayne secured the relinquishment of British forts in the Great Lakes area to the United States. While on a military excursion from Fort Detroit to Pennsylvania, he died suddenly at Presque Isle (Erie), Pennsylvania, on December 16, 1796. Paul G. Pierpaoli Jr. and Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Fox, Joseph L. Anthony Wayne: Washington’s Reliable General. Chicago: Adams Presses, 1988. Gaff, Alan D. Bayonets in the Wilderness: Anthony Wayne’s Legion in the Old Northwest. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2004. Nelson, Paul David. Anthony Wayne: Soldier of the Early Republic. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985. Tucker, Glenn. Mad Anthony Wayne and the New Nation: The Story of Washington’s Front-Line General. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole, 1973.

Women Women played a vital albeit largely unsung role in the American Revolutionary War. Although virtually all women were then relegated to the roles of wife and mother and were largely absent from the political realm in the late eighteenth century, they nevertheless had a significant behind-the-scenes impact on the war effort. As many men went off to war, women were expected to stay behind and manage the family farm or business and keep the family together. Other women became camp followers, accompanying armies in the field. There they worked as nurses, laundresses, cooks, seamstresses, and even sometimes spies or messengers. Other women, particularly those who were poor, became camp followers because they were unable to eke out an existence without their husbands. Still others purposely chose to follow their husbands into battle. Some historians claim that women made up perhaps 3 percent of camp populations during the war. This would seem borne out

240 | Women

by a report for the main Continental Army force at Valley Forge in December 1777 that showed 400 women present, or 1 woman for each 44 enlisted men. In May 1777, the ratio of women with the British forces in New York was about 1 for every 8 men, and with German units it was perhaps 1 woman for every 30 men. Women greatly assisted the Patriot war effort (both before and during the conflict) by participating in the boycotts of British goods. In the wake of the Townshend Acts of 1767, many North American colonists implemented nonimportation agreements that boycotted British imports. American women played the crucial role in ensuring that these agreements were successful. Indeed, in their primary roles as homemakers, women launched the homespun movement, spurning satin, silk, and imported wool and cotton garments for clothing they made at home with material produced in America. During periods of nonimportation and during the war itself, many women engaged in spinning and quilting bees. These same women sewed uniforms and made blankets for use by soldiers in the field. Jane Mecom, Benjamin Franklin’s sister, with the help of Franklin’s printing presses, widely distributed her recipe for homemade soap, and she even included detailed instructions on how to create soap-making forms. It is worth noting that while men who performed functions indispensable to the war effort (such as blacksmithing and metalworking) were generally excluded from military duty, women who performed similarly critical functions received no recompense. Women performed these tasks out of a sense of civic duty and as wives and mothers. Most Patriot women did not translate their support for the war into overtly political roles, but a few did. In Edenton, North

Carolina, for instance, some 50 women drew up their own nonimportation agreement in October 1774 and then sent it to British newspapers. In 1773, Clementina Rind assumed publication of the Virginia Gazette upon her husband’s death. She ensured that the newspaper remained a powerful political and propaganda tool for the war effort. During the war, groups such as the Ladies Association in Philadelphia were formed to contribute to the war effort and raise money for army supplies. By 1780, other similar groups had been formed in other colonies, raising hundreds of thousands of dollars that were used to purchase uniforms, food, and other supplies for the military. Although some Continental Army officers, including General George Washington, the commander in chief of the Continental Army, chafed at the presence of women in military encampments, it is generally acknowledged that women helped the camps run more efficiently. Even Washington’s own wife, Martha, was known for her prolonged visits to winter encampments. These were always morale boosters for the rank and file, and many soldiers came to see her as a mother figure. Another major female role model was Mercy Otis Warren, who was a poet, pamphleteer, playwright, propagandist, and historian. An extremely well-read and keenly intelligent woman, Warren soon formed close friendships with leading figures in colonial New England and beyond, including Abigail Adams, Martha Washington, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and Alexander Hamilton. A number of Warren’s early written works ardently supported the Patriot cause and enumerated colonial grievances against British rule. Throughout the conflict, she remained a dedicated Patriot and maintained extensive

Women | 241

Mercy Otis Warren (1729–1814) was a prominent American historian of the Revolutionary War era, as well as a poet and playwright. (Cirker, Hayward and Blanche Cirker, eds. Dictionary of American Portraits, 1967)

correspondence with numerous Patriot leaders, including General Washington, and with various prominent women of the era. During 1805–1806, Warren published her literary magnum opus, the three-volume History of the Rise, Progress, and Termination of the American Revolution. A very small group of women also served in the war as soldiers, almost invariably by disguising their gender. Because most served under aliases and were thus not recorded in official rosters, it is impossible to say how many women might have served in the war in this capacity. Certainly, no more than a few hundred—at best—served as soldiers. Among the known women soldiers were Deborah Sampson (who wrote about her exploits), Sally St. Clair, and

Anna Maria Lane. One woman, Margaret Cochran Corbin, became a makeshift artillerist during fighting at Fort Washington, New York, on November 16, 1776. After her husband was killed, she was said to have taken part in serving the cannon herself and was badly wounded and taken prisoner by the British but later released. Loyalist women experienced a far different set of experiences during the American Revolutionary War. British Army guidelines discouraged female camp followers, so relatively few women accompanied troops on campaigns. Even if a woman did not publicize her loyalties, was married to a Loyalist, or came from a Loyalist family, she could be subjected to violence or intimidation. She was essentially considered guilty by mere association. Wives of wealthy Loyalists were liable to have their real and personal property confiscated by Patriot authorities, particularly those women whose husbands were fighting on the British side. Life was lonely, difficult, and stressful for Loyalist women between 1775 and 1783. A number of female Loyalists opted to leave their homes and take up residence in British-controlled areas; others fled to the relative safety of Canada, England, or the British West Indies. Oftentimes, however, the decision to flee accompanied a far more agonizing decision. Many Loyalist women were forced to leave behind any male children beyond the age of 12 because they were usually drafted into Patriot service. By 1779 or so, many state treason statutes had changed their wording to take into account female Loyalists. Indeed, some statutes included gendered language that recognized women by replacing the term men with persons or substituting he and she for he. Particularly in Massachusetts, the Patriot government tried to give Loyalist women

242 | Women

some capability of political and economic independence by mandating that Loyalist women who chose to stay in the state in lieu of joining their spouses in exile could keep their property. However, women who left with their husbands were liable to have any real or personal property confiscated. A few Loyalist women became active resisters of Patriot rule. In 1779, three Loyalist women hatched a failed plot to kidnap the Patriot mayor of Albany, New York. Others refused to take the loyalty oaths of state or local Patriot governments, and some actively encouraged other Loyalist women to do the same. A few also worked as British spies. The extent to which women’s lives were changed by the American Revolutionary War largely depended on race and socioeconomic circumstances, although in general it can be said that women’s roles—and males’ perceptions of women—did not undergo any sort of revolutionary shifts. Women remained shut out of politics and the political process and continued to be viewed primarily as wives and mothers. Few postwar women became economically independent. Middle-class and white women witnessed the largest extent of changes in gender experiences, while the lives of African American and poor white women remained largely unchanged. American Indian women actually saw their roles diminish, in large part due to the American government’s demands and expectations that Native Americans adopt white, European lifestyles. For many women, particularly wealthier white women, the postwar period saw a change in the expectations of marriage. Prearranged marriages became less prevalent, and women were now encouraged to marry a spouse based on genuine affection. In the domestic realm at least, these women achieved more equality in marriage, even if

their roles in those marriages remained unchanged. Daughters in wealthy families increasingly chose to delay marriage or remain single for the entirety of their lives. To go along with these changes in the middle and upper classes, education for women (whose families could afford to pay for it) became far more prevalent. In 1775, it is estimated that only about 50 percent of white women were literate (compared to 80 percent for white men). Beginning in the mid1780s, a host of new schools sprang up that solely catered to young white women. Education was now seen as critical in imbuing the virtues of republican political tenets in the nation’s youths. Most women, however, did not attend college or university even after the war ended, and most women were barred from traditional male occupations, such as the law and politics, which usually required some level of postsecondary education. By 1800, the literacy rate separating white women and men had narrowed significantly, but it would require at least another century before women en masse could aspire to university education. Another area in which women rose in prominence and importance after the war was organized religion. This became especially apparent during the Second Great Awakening. Although some African American women viewed the revolution with quiet hope, a chance perhaps to escape the bonds of misery and servitude, they soon learned that a Patriot victory, for all of its rhetoric about the universal rights of man and equality among men, would not bring an end to slavery. Some African American women did escape bondage when they joined the British side (which the British themselves actively encouraged), but the vast majority did not. Most African Americans in North America remained in slavery after 1783, as they had prior to 1775. Their contributions

Women | 243

to the war effort were nevertheless significant, even if largely unrecorded or acknowledged. Indeed, their forced labor, particularly in the South, enabled plantations and farms to function while owners were away fighting the war or conducting other business. It would have been impossi­ ble for the Patriots to feed and clothe their army or to secure foreign loans and assistance from abroad without the considerable output of plantations in the mid-Atlantic and the South. Finally, for Native American women, the American Revolutionary War never brought with it even a faint hope of improvement in their lives. The war involved large numbers of Indian groups and nations; these conflicts severely disrupted tribal life and altered gender roles during the war. When male warriors were off fighting, women received the extra burden of providing for the needs of the tribe as a whole in addition to providing for the spiritual and material needs of their own families. The war and its aftermath resulted in the loss of millions of acres of ancestral Indian lands, which also severely disrupted Native American societies and cultures. Americans, far more so than the British, expected American Indians to adopt European lifestyles and culture. Among other things, this required Native Americans to give up their seminomadic hunting culture, which was to be supplanted by sedentary agriculture. Because white Americans did not view farming as women’s work (most Indian women had previously done the farming while the men hunted and fished), they insisted that Indian males take up farming, relegating women to household

chores exclusively. This, of course, reversed gender roles and brought many problems for Indians in the postwar period. Clearly, the American Revolution was a mixed bag for women. Some groups reaped modest benefits, while other groups actually witnessed their fortunes decrease significantly. In a sense, however, even though women as a whole did not gain much from the conflict, the changes it wrought, especially among the middle and upper classes, helped create the foundations upon which women’s reform initiatives that sought to end slavery, promulgate abstinence from liquor, and advance women’s rights were built. Paul G. Pierpaoli Jr.

Further Reading De Pauw, Linda G., and Conover Hunt. “Remember the Ladies”: Women in America, 1750–1815. New York: Viking, 1976. Lucey, Donna M. I Dwell in Possibility: Women Build a Nation, 1600–1920. Washington, DC: National Geographic Society, 2001. Norton, Mary Beth. Founding Mothers and Fathers: Gendered Power and the Forming of the American Society. New York: Knopf, 1996. Norton, Mary Beth. Liberty’s Daughters: The Revolutionary Experience of American Women, 1750–1800. Boston: Little, Brown, 1980. Roberts, Cokie. Ladies of Liberty: The Women Who Shaped Our Nation. New York: William Morrow, 2008. Stuart, Nancy Rubin. The Muse of the Revolution: The Secret Pen of Mercy Otis Warren and the Founding of a Nation. Boston: Beacon, 2008.

Y Yorktown Campaign (August 21–October 19, 1781)

4,000-man French Legion under Lieutenant General Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau, the commander of the French Army in North America. In May 1781, French commodore JacquesMelchoir Saint-Laurent, comte de Barras, arrived with a small squadron at Newport, Rhode Island, bringing news that Admiral François-Joseph-Paul, comte de GrasseTilly, was on his way to the West Indies from France with a powerful fleet and that de Grasse would bring the fleet north during the hurricane season. In the meantime, Washington dispatched 1,200 men under Continental Army major general Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, to trap British forces under the turncoat brigadier general Benedict Arnold that were raiding along the James River in eastern Virginia. Cornwallis arrived in Virginia at this time and assumed command of all British forces there, now about 7,000 men, representing a quarter of British armed strength in North America. On August 4, with the allies having called off their offensive against New York, General Clinton sent new orders to Cornwallis, allowing him to keep all his troops in Virginia. Having tried but failed to bag the far smaller Continental Army forces under Lafayette, Cornwallis retired with 7,000 men to the small tobacco port of Yorktown on the York River, where he could be in communication by water with Clinton in New York. Lafayette, with 4,500 men, kept watch from West Point, upstream from

The Yorktown campaign was the last major military campaign of the American Revolutionary War. By 1781, the war was in stalemate. In 1778, the British had shifted the military emphasis to the American South, securing Savannah, Georgia (December 29, 1778), and then Georgia and capturing Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina (May 12, 1780). Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton, the British commander in chief in North America, who had commanded during the Siege of Charles Town, then returned to New York, leaving his second-in-command, Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis, to secure the remainder of the Carolinas. Cornwallis had waged an aggressive campaign, but after sustaining heavy casualties in defeating Continental Army forces led by Major General Nathanael Greene in the Battle of Guilford Courthouse (March 15, 1781), he had decided to march the majority of his forces north into Virginia to cut the Continental Army supply lines southward to the Carolinas and strengthen his force by a junction with British troops operating in the Chesapeake Bay region. Meanwhile, General George Washington, the Continental Army commander, wanted to launch a combined American and French assault against British-occupied New York, and toward that end, he had positioned his main forces at White Plains. These forces included the Duc de Lauzun’s

245

246 | Yorktown Campaign

Painting of Continental Army commander General George Washington inspecting a French artillery battery during the successful Franco-American Siege of Yorktown, Virginia, in 1781. (Grafton, John, ed., The American Revolution, A Picture Sourcebook, 1975)

Yorktown, informing Washington of developments. On August 5, de Grasse, having taken on 3,300 French troops and a small siege train supplied by Santo Domingo governor Comte de Lillancourt, sailed from Cap François for North America with 28 ships of the line. British rear admiral Samuel Hood pursued with 14 ships of the line. On August 14, Washington learned that de Grasse would not be coming to New York but would instead sail to Chesapeake Bay, arriving there later the same month and remaining until mid-October. Washington and Rochambeau (who had opposed an offensive in New York) immediately saw the possibilities. If de Grasse could hold the bay while Washington came down from the land side, they might bag Cornwallis at Yorktown. Washington ordered Lafayette to contain Cornwallis, and on August 21, Lafayette

sent 2,000 American and 4,000 French soldiers in forced marches southward, leaving only 2,000 men under Major General William Heath to watch British forces at New York under Clinton. Clinton did not realize what had happened until early September. Although Clinton promised Cornwallis a diversion, he in fact did little to help his subordinate, with whom he did not get along. On August 24, meanwhile, Barras sailed from Newport with 8 ships of the line and 18 transports carrying 1,000 ground troops bound for the Chesapeake. On August 17, Admiral Hood arrived at Chesapeake Bay with 14 ships of the line, but with no sign of the French fleet under de Grasse, which he had unknowingly passed during his voyage south, Hood set sail for New York. There he joined forces with Rear Admiral Thomas Graves, the commander of British naval forces in North America.



As the senior officer, Graves assumed command, and on August 31, with 5 ships of the line of his own and Hood’s 14, Graves sailed from New York for Chesapeake Bay, Barras’s presumed destination. De Grasse arrived off the Virginia Capes on August 30 with 28 ships of the line and 5 frigates and secured the water approaches to Yorktown. He then began sending ashore his 3,300 ground troops under Major General Claude-Anne de Rouvroy, marquis de SaintSimon-Montbléru. De Grasse then detached transports and smaller ships to carry the other allied armies down the bay from Head of Elk (Elkton, Maryland), Baltimore, and Annapolis. Graves meanwhile, sailing faster than his prey, arrived off the Chesapeake before Barras. On September 5, a French frigate signaled the British approach. Instead of swooping down on the unprepared French ships, Graves, hampered by an inadequate signaling system and unwilling to risk a general action against a superior enemy (19 ships of the line to 28), deployed his ships into a line-ahead formation and waited for de Grasse to come out. Shorthanded with 90 of his officers and 1,500 sailors on ferrying duties up the bay and aware of his poor position, de Grasse stood out with 24 ships of the line to meet the British. Hood, however, had not assimilated Graves’s signals and in any case did not cooperate with Graves. In consequence, during the ensuing Second Battle of the Chesapeake (Second Battle of the Capes) on September 5, only a portion of the British ships closed with their adversary. The French, in any case, sought to avoid a close engagement, and the battle was inconclusive with no ships lost on either side. The next day, Graves chose to effect repairs to his squadron’s masts and rigging. Inconclusive maneuvering followed. On

Yorktown Campaign | 247

September 8 and 9, the French briefly gained the wind and threatened to reengage. On September 9, French frigates spotted the arrival of Barras’s ships, and de Grasse turned back to the Chesapeake that night. Notified on September 13 that de Grasse was back in the Chesapeake but not yet aware of Barras’s arrival there, Graves held a council of war with his captains, leading to the decision to return to New York, make repairs, gather additional ships, and then return. This, however, occurred too late to save Cornwallis. Thus, this tactically inconclusive naval battle ranks among the most important strategic victories in world history. American and French troops under Washington and Rochambeau began assembling at Williamsburg near Yorktown on September 14, and the next day, they staged an impressive review with nearly 17,000 men, double the number of the British force at Yorktown. On September 14, meanwhile, Cornwallis received a letter from Clinton that he was assembling a relief force and that it would arrive at Yorktown no later than October 5. This news helped dissuade Cornwallis from an effort to break free before the establishment of allied siege lines at Yorktown. On September 17, Washington, chief of artillery Major General Henry Knox, and French Army officer and Continental Army colonel Louis Antoine Jean Le Bègue de Presle Duportail met with Admiral de Grasse aboard his flagship and worked out a siege strategy, with de Grasse agreeing to contribute some heavy guns from the ships of his fleet. On September 28, the combined French and Continental Army forces marched the 12 miles from Williamsburg to Yorktown and commenced the siege of that place. Washington had at his disposal some 9,000

248 | Yorktown Campaign

American troops—3,000 of whom were militia, who played no role in the battle— and 7,500 French soldiers under Rochambeau. Washington also had both French field and siege artillery and the services of highly trained French military engineers. The allies then commenced siege operations with the construction of trenches and parallels toward the British lines. On September 30, the allies completed the outer ring of their siege lines, and on October 1, they opened fire on the British positions. On October 6, the allies began construction of the first parallel. Three days later, the Americans and French began a sustained bombardment with 100 guns, and on October 10, allied artillery fire brought the burning of the Royal Navy fifth-rate frigate Sharon (44 guns) and the sinking of several transports in the York River. On October 11, the allies began construction of a second siege line only 400 yards from the British line. On the night of October 14, the allies stormed two key British redoubts, enabling them to complete their second siege line and compromise the British defensive line. On October 16, Cornwallis launched a desperate British counterattack. Although the assaulting troops temporarily captured a French redoubt, they were soon driven back. Too late, Cornwallis attempted to escape across the York River to Gloucester Point, which Washington had largely neglected, but this effort was thwarted by a severe storm. Now low on food, on the morning of October 17, Cornwallis was forced to seek terms, seeking parole for his men. But Washington insisted that the British

surrender as prisoners of war. Cornwallis reluctantly agreed, and the formal surrender occurred on October 19, with 8,077 British—840 seamen, 80 camp followers, and 7,157 soldiers—passing under allied control. During the siege, the British losses were 156 killed and 326 wounded. The allies suffered 75 killed and 199 wounded (two-thirds of them French). The very day of the formal surrender, Clinton sailed from New York for Chesapeake Bay with Graves and 25 ships of the line escorting transports with 7,000 land troops. The Yorktown campaign was certainly one of the most important of the war. It brought a change in the British government and the decision to grant independence to the Americans. Spencer C. Tucker

Further Reading Davis, Burke. The Campaign That Won America: The Story of Yorktown. New York: Dial, 1970. Greene, Jerome A. The Guns of Independence: The Siege of Yorktown, 1781. New York: Savas Beattie. 2005. Larrabee, Harold A. Decision at the Chesapeake. New York: Clarkson N. Potter, 1964. Lumpkin, Henry. From Savannah to Yorktown: The American Revolution in the South. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1981. Morrissey, Brenden. Yorktown, 1781: The World Turned Upside Down. London: Osprey, 1997. Wickwire, Franklin, and Mary Wickwire. Cornwallis: The American Adventure. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1970.

Primary Documents

An act for the better securing the dependency of his majesty’s dominions in America upon the crown and parliament of Great Britain.

1. Declaratory Act (1766) The Stamp Act was part of the British plan to tax the North American colonies to provide for the support of the colonial military and government. Passed by Parliament on March 22, 1765, the Stamp Act imposed the first tax that Britain ever directly levied on its North American colonists. The Stamp Act sparked tremendous protest among the colonists, and riots erupted in several cities. In October, many of the colonies sent delegates to the Stamp Act Congress in New York City to draft official protests and resolutions against the tax. Throughout North America, colonists began to examine more closely their relationship with Britain and their rights as Englishmen. After November 1, the date the act was to take effect, many colonial businesses and government offices shut down rather than comply with the law. Parliament came to realize that the Stamp Act was impossible to enforce and repealed it on March 18, 1766. Not wishing to appear to have caved to colonial pressure, Parliament quickly passed the Declaratory Act, affirming its right to tax the colonies. The Declaratory Act stated unequivocally that Parliament had the right to pass whatever laws it wished in regard to Britain’s North American colonies. In their triumph over the repeal of the Stamp Act, many colonists overlooked the Declaratory Act.

Whereas several of the houses of representatives in his Majesty’s colonies and plantations in America, have of late against law, claimed to themselves, or to the general assemblies of the same, the sole and exclusive right of imposing duties and taxes upon his majesty’s subjects in the said colonies and plantations; and have in pursuance of such claim, passed certain votes, resolutions, and orders derogatory to the legislative authority of parliament, and inconsistent with the dependency of the said colonies and plantations upon the crown of Great Britain: may it therefore please your most excellent Majesty, that it may be declared; and be it declared by the King’s most excellent majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the lords spiritual and temporal, and commons, in this present parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, That the said colonies and plantations in America have been, are, and of right ought to be, subordinate unto, and dependent upon the imperial crown and parliament of Great Britain; and that the King’s majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the lords spiritual and temporal, and commons of 249

250 | Primary Documents

Great Britain, in parliament assembled, had, hath, and of right ought to have, full power and authority to make laws and statutes of sufficient force and validity to bind the colonies and people of America, subjects of the crown of Great Britain, in all cases whatsoever, II. And be it further declared and enacted by the authority aforesaid, That all resolutions, votes, orders, and proceedings, in any of the said colonies or plantations, whereby the power and authority of the parliament of Great Britain, to make laws and statutes as aforesaid, is denied, or drawn into question, are, and are hereby declared to be, utterly null and void to all in purposes whatsoever. Source: Danby Pickering, Statutes at Large . . . (Cambridge, UK: J. Bentham, 1762–1869).

2. The Townshend Acts (1767) Many in the British government were angry that colonial protests had forced them to repeal the Stamp Act and the Sugar Act. Charles Townshend, the powerful chancellor of the exchequer, continued to believe that the colonies should pay to support their own army and government. Townshend proposed legislation to tax a number of goods imported to the American colonies, which represented an attempt by the British government to raise revenue from the colonists through a tax on external trade. Passed by Parliament on July 2, 1767, the Townshend Acts quickly sparked widespread colonial protests, particularly because the new laws established an American Board of Customs charged with cracking down on smuggling and authorized the board to grant writs of assistance (sweeping search warrants). The colonies responded with letters of protest to the British government, nonimportation

agreements, and the notorious Massachusetts Circular Letter, which called for the various colonies to unite against British authority. Townshend died a few months after passage of the acts, leaving his successors to enforce them. Parliament gradually rescinded the tax on all of the items enumerated in the laws, except tea. Whereas it is expedient that a revenue should be raised, in your Majesty’s dominions in America, for making a more certain and adequate provision for defraying the charge of the administration of justice, and the support of civil government in such provinces where it shall be found necessary, and towards further defraying the expenses of defending, protecting, and securing the said dominions; we, your majesty’s most dutiful and loyal subjects, the commons of Great Britain in Parliament assembled, have therefore resolved to give and grant unto your Majesty the several rates and duties hereinafter mentioned; and do most humbly beseech your Majesty that it may be enacted and be it enacted . . . that from and after the twentieth day of November one thousand seven hundred and sixty-seven, there shall be raised, levied, collected and paid, unto his Majesty, his heirs and successors, for and upon the respective goods hereinafter mentioned, which shall be imported from Great Britain into any colony or plantation in America which now is, or hereafter may be, under the dominion of his Majesty, his heirs or successors, the several rates and duties following [on glass, red and white lead, painters’ colours, three pence a pound on tea, and on many varieties of paper]. . . .



IV. And it is hereby further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that the said rates and duties, charged by this Act upon goods imported into any British American colony or plantation, shall be deemed, and are hereby declared to be, sterling money of Great Britain; and shall be collected, recovered, and paid, to the amount of the value which such nominal sums bear in Great Britain; and that such monies may be received and taken, according to the proportion and value of five shillings and sixpence the ounce in silver. . . . V. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that his Majesty and his successors shall be, and are hereby, empowered, from time to time, by any warrant or warrants under his or their royal sign manual or sign manuals, countersigned by the high treasurer, or any three or more of the commissioners of the treasury for the time being to cause such monies to be applied out of the produce of the duties granted by this Act, as his Majesty or his successors shall think proper or necessary, for defraying the charges of the administration of justice, and the support of the civil government within all or any of the said colonies or plantations. . . . X. [Because earlier Acts to prevent frauds in trade authorized writs of assistance but did not expressly provide for any particular court to grant them to the officers of the customs in the colonies] it is doubted whether such officers can legally enter houses and other places on land, to search for and seize goods, in the manner directed by the said recited Acts: To obviate which doubts for the future, and in order to carry the intention of the said recited Acts into effectual execution, be it enacted, . . . that from and after the said twentieth day of November, one thousand seven hundred and sixty-seven, such writs of assistance, to

Primary Documents | 251

authorize and empower the officers of his Majesty’s customs to enter and go into any house, warehouse, shop, cellar, or other place, in the British colonies or plantations in America, to search for and seize prohibited or uncustomed goods, in the manner directed by the said recited Acts, shall and may be granted by the said superior or supreme court of justice having jurisdiction within such colony or plantation respectively. Source: Danby Pickering, Statutes at Large . . . (Cambridge, UK: J. Bentham, 1762–1869).

3. Newspaper Account of the Boston Massacre (1770) A week after the deadly March 5, 1770, confrontation between British troops and a rowdy gang of Boston citizens, this report appeared in a Boston newspaper, beginning the process of distorting events and marshaling public opinion against the British. Bostonian resentment of the soldiers’ presence had been building since the king sent them to Boston in the autumn of 1768 to maintain order and protect the customs officials charged with enforcing the Townshend Acts. Off-duty soldiers and local citizens frequently got into fistfights. On March 5, 1770, the Boston gang began the confrontation by harassing the soldiers, throwing rocks and snowballs, and brandishing clubs. The first shot fired by a British regular was probably the result of nerves, not an order to fire, and in the confusion, other soldiers fired their muskets. However, this article states as fact that a British soldier started the confrontation by being the first to strike a blow and that the commander of the British soldiers ordered them to fire. Patriots began calling the

252 | Primary Documents

incident the “Boston Massacre,” and they publicized it throughout the colonies. On the evening of Monday, being the fifth current, several soldiers of the 29th Regiment were seen parading the streets with their drawn cutlasses and bayonets, abusing and wounding numbers of the inhabitants. A few minutes after nine o’clock four youths, named Edward Archbald, William Merchant, Francis Archbald, and John Leech, jun., came down Cornhill together, and separating at Doctor Loring’s corner, the two former were passing the narrow alley leading to Murray’s barrack in which was a soldier brandishing a broad sword of an uncommon size against the walls, out of which he struck fire plentifully. A person of mean countenance armed with a large cudgel bore him company. Edward Archbald admonished Mr. Merchant to take care of the sword, on which the soldier turned round and struck Archbald on the arm, then pushed at Merchant and pierced through his clothes inside the arm close to the armpit and grazed the skin. Merchant then struck the soldier with a short stick he had; and the other person ran to the barrack and brought with him two soldiers, one armed with a pair of tongs, the other with a shovel. He with the tongs pursued Archbald back through the alley, collared and laid him over the head with the tongs. The noise brought people together; and John Hicks, a young lad, coming up, knocked the soldier down but let him get up again; and more lads gathering, drove them back to the barrack where the boys stood some time as it were to keep them in. In less than a minute ten or twelve of them came out with drawn cutlasses, clubs, and bayonets and set upon the unarmed boys and

young folk who stood them a little while but, finding the inequality of their equipment, dispersed. On hearing the noise, one Samuel Atwood came up to see what was the matter; and entering the alley from dock square, heard the latter part of the combat; and when the boys had dispersed he met the ten or twelve soldiers aforesaid rushing down the alley towards the square and asked them if they intended to murder people? They answered Yes, by G-d, root and branch! With that one of them struck Mr. Atwood with a club which was repeated by another; and being unarmed, he turned to go off and received a wound on the left shoulder which reached the bone and gave him much pain. Retreating a few steps, Mr. Atwood met two officers and said, gentlemen, what is the matter? They answered, you’ll see by and by. Immediately after, those heroes appeared in the square, asking where were the boogers? where were the cowards? But notwithstanding their fierceness to naked men, one of them advanced towards a youth who had a split of a raw stave in his hand and said, damn them, here is one of them. But the young man seeing a person near him with a drawn sword and good cane ready to support him, held up his stave in defiance; and they quietly passed by him up the little alley by Mr. Silsby’s to King Street where they attacked single and unarmed persons till they raised much clamour, and then turned down Cornhill Street, insulting all they met in like manner and pursuing some to their very doors. Thirty or forty persons, mostly lads, being by this means gathered in King Street, Capt. Preston with a party of men with charged bayonets, came from the main guard to the commissioner’s house, the soldiers pushing their bayonets, crying, make way! They took place by the custom house



and, continuing to push to drive the people off, pricked some in several places, on which they were clamorous and, it is said, threw snow balls. On this, the Captain commanded them to fire; and more snow balls coming, he again said, damn you, fire, be the consequence what it will! One soldier then fired, and a townsman with a cudgel struck him over the hands with such force that he dropped his firelock; and, rushing forward, aimed a blow at the Captain’s head which grazed his hat and fell pretty heavy upon his arm. However, the soldiers continued the fire successively till seven or eight or, as some say, eleven guns were discharged. Source: Boston Gazette and Country Journal, March 12, 1770.

4. “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death” (1775) On March 23, 1775, less than a month before the first shots of the American Revolution, the radical American Patriot Patrick Henry delivered this prescient speech to the Virginia House of Burgesses, urging his peers in the house to adopt a series of resolves asserting the colonies’ right to selfgovernment. Although Henry’s rhetoric was too radical for many Virginians, this speech was widely reprinted and circulated in newspapers throughout North America and helped stir Patriot sentiment against British rule. Born to Scottish parents on the Virginia frontier in 1736, Henry worked as a shopkeeper and a farmer and married at the age of 18. Needing to make more money to support his family, Henry studied to become a lawyer. As a lawyer, he showed a speaking ability that won cases and later stirred

Primary Documents | 253

Virginians to take up arms against Great Britain. Elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses, Henry represented and served the people of the frontier from which he had come. He and the royal governor, Lord Dunmore, became bitter opponents as the colony moved toward revolution. When the rebels drove Dunmore from Virginia, Henry was elected governor in his place. After the American Revolutionary War, President George Washington offered him the positions of secretary of state or chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, but Henry turned them down and spent the remainder of his life as an attorney. No man thinks more highly than I do of the patriotism, as well as abilities, of the very worthy gentlemen who have just addressed the house. But different men often see the same subject in different lights; and, therefore, I hope it will not be thought disrespectful to those gentlemen if, entertaining as I do opinions of a character very opposite to theirs, I shall speak forth my sentiments freely and without reserve. This is no time for ceremony. The question before the house is one of awful moment to this country. For my own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery; and in proportion to the magnitude of the subject ought to be the freedom of the debate. It is only in this way that we can hope to arrive at the truth, and fulfill the great responsibility which we hold to God and our country. Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offense, I should consider myself as guilty of treason towards my country, and of an act of disloyalty toward the Majesty of Heaven, which I revere above all earthly kings.

254 | Primary Documents

Mr. President, it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that siren till she transforms us into beasts. Is this the part of wise men, engaged in a great and arduous struggle for liberty? Are we disposed to be of the numbers of those who, having eyes, see not, and, having ears, hear not, the things which so nearly concern their temporal salvation? For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth, to know the worst, and to provide for it. I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past. And judging by the past, I wish to know what there has been in the conduct of the British ministry for the last ten years to justify those hopes with which gentlemen have been pleased to solace themselves and the House. Is it that insidious smile with which our petition has been lately received? Trust it not, sir; it will prove a snare to your feet. Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a kiss. Ask yourselves how this gracious reception of our petition comports with those warlike preparations which cover our waters and darken our land. Are fleets and armies necessary to a work of love and reconciliation? Have we shown ourselves so unwilling to be reconciled that force must be called in to win back our love? Let us not deceive ourselves, sir. These are the implements of war and subjugation; the last arguments to which kings resort. I ask gentlemen, sir, what means this martial array, if its purpose be not to force us to submission? Can gentlemen assign any other possible motive for it? Has Great Britain any enemy, in this quarter of the world, to call for all this accumulation of navies and armies? No, sir, she has none. They are

meant for us: they can be meant for no other. They are sent over to bind and rivet upon us those chains which the British ministry have been so long forging. And what have we to oppose to them? Shall we try argument? Sir, we have been trying that for the last ten years. Have we anything new to offer upon the subject? Nothing. We have held the subject up in every light of which it is capable; but it has been all in vain. Shall we resort to entreaty and humble supplication? What terms shall we find which have not been already exhausted? Let us not, I beseech you, sir, deceive ourselves. Sir, we have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne! In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation. There is no longer any room for hope. If we wish to be free—if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending—if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained— we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms and to the God of hosts is all that is left us! They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be



when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? Sir, we are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power. The millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable—and let it come! I repeat it, sir, let it come. It is in vain, sir, to extentuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace—but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death! Source: Selim H. Peabody, American Patriotism: Speeches, Letters and Other Papers Which Illustrate the Foundation, the Development, the

Primary Documents | 255 Preservation of the United States of America (New York: American Book Exchange, 1880), 108–110.

5. Thomas Gage’s Report on Battle of Lexington-Concord (1775) General Thomas Gage commanded the British Army forces in Boston. On April 14, 1775, he received orders from England to enforce the Acts of Parliament. Spies working for Gage had told him that the Massachusetts Militia had stored weapons and supplies in Concord, 18 miles outside of Boston. Gage ordered Lieutenant Colonel Francis Smith to march through Lexington and on to Concord to seize or destroy these weapons and supplies. About 700 British soldiers departed Boston between 1:00 a.m. and 2:00 a.m. on April 19, 1775. Patriot observers detected British preparations for the march. Paul Revere and William Dawes spread the alarm through the countryside. Groups of Patriot minutemen rapidly assembled, including 130 militia members commanded by Captain John Parker, who gathered in Lexington. The British entered Lexington and encountered Parker’s men. A British officer ordered the militia to surrender their weapons. Someone fired a shot. Which side fired first remains unknown. This was the famous “shot heard round the world,” the first shot in America’s war for independence. The Lexington militia broke and ran. The British proceeded to Concord, where they found a small militia force trying to carry off or hide military supplies. These militia retreated. However, at least 75 militia companies lived within five miles of the road the British had used to march to Concord. They were gathering quickly and

256 | Primary Documents

would soon outnumber the British by about four to one. When the British began burning military supplies in Concord, a group of militia advanced toward the North Bridge to oppose them. This advance led to a brief exchange of fire that killed and wounded soldiers on both sides. The Americans drove the British back into Concord. Colonel Smith saw that greater numbers of minutemen were forming around Concord. Around noon, he ordered a retreat to Boston. Minutemen took advantage of stone fences and nearby buildings to fire at the British as they marched along the road. Smith’s column suffered heavy losses. A second British force met Smith on his return march and saved him from complete destruction. By dusk, the tired and battered British had returned to Boston. Before Lexington and Concord, Patriots had annoyed British soldiers but never shot at them. Except for the so-called Boston Massacre, the British had never responded to this abuse by firing their weapons. After April 19, everything changed: the American Patriots and King George’s soldiers were now enemies. Gage wrote his official report 12 days after the fighting. He claimed to have suffered “above 50 killed and many more wounded.” In fact, he lost 73 killed and 174 wounded. A circumstantial Account of an Attack that happened on the 19th of April, 1775, on His Majesty’s Troops, by a number of the People of the Province of the Massachusetts-Bay. On Tuesday the 18th of April, about half-past ten at night, Lieutenant Colonel Smith, of the Tenth Regiment, embarked from the Common, at Boston, with the Grenadiers and

Light-Infantry of the Troops there, and landed on the opposite side; from whence he began his march towards Concord, where he was ordered to destroy a magazine of military stores, deposited there for the use of an Army to be assembled in order to act against His Majesty and his Government. The Colonel called his officers together, and gave orders that the Troops should not fire unless fired upon; and after marching a few miles, detached six Companies of Light-Infantry, under the command of Major Pitcairn, to take possession of two bridges on the other side of Concord. Soon after, they heard many signal guns, and the ringing of alarm-bells repeatedly, which convinced them that the country was rising to oppose them, and that it was a preconcerted scheme to oppose the King’s Troops, whenever there should be a favourable opportunity for it. About three o’clock the next morning, the Troops being advanced with two miles of Lexington, intelligence was received that about five hundred men in arms were assembled, and determined to oppose the King’s Troops; and on Major Pitcairn’s galloping up to the head of the advanced Companies, two officers informed him that a man (advanced from those that were assembled) had presented his musket, and attempted to shoot them, but the piece flashed in the pan. On this the Major gave directions to the Troops to move forward, but on no account to fire, nor even to attempt it without orders. When they arrived at the end of the village, they observed about two hundred armed men drawn up on a green, and when the Troops came within one hundred yards of them they began to

Primary Documents | 257



file off towards some stone walls on their right flank; the Light-Infantry, observing this, ran after them. The Major instantly called to the soldiers not to fire, but to surround and disarm them. Some of them who had jumped over the wall, then fired four or five shot at the Troops, wounded a man of the Tenth Regiment, and the Major’s horse in two places, and at the same time several shots were fired from meeting-house on the left. Upon this, without any order or regularity, the Light-Infantry began a scattered fire, and killed several of the country people, but were silenced as soon as the authority of their officers could make them. After this, Colonel Smith marched up with the remainder of the detachment, and the whole body proceeded to Concord, where they arrived about nine o’clock, without any thing further happening; but vast numbers of armed people were seen assembling on all the heights. While Colonel Smith, with the Grenadiers and part of the Light-Infantry, remained at Concord to search for cannon, &c., there, he detached Captain Parsons, with six light companies, to secure a bridge at some distance from Concord, and to proceed from thence to certain houses, where it was supposed there was cannon and ammunition. Captain Parsons, in pursuance of these orders, posted three companies at the bridge, and on some heights near it, under the command of Captain Laurie, of the Forty-Third Regiment, and with the remainder went and destroyed some cannon-wheels, powder, and ball. The people still continued increasing on the heights, and in about an hour after, a large body of them began to move towards the bridge. The light

companies of the Fourth and Tenth then descended and joined Captain Laurie. The people continued to advance in great numbers, and fired upon the King’s Troops; killed three men, wounded four officers, one sergeant, and four privates; upon which (after returning the fire) Captain Laurie and his officers thought it prudent to retreat towards the main body at Concord, and were soon joined by two companies of Grenadiers. When Captain Parsons returned with the three Companies over the bridge, they observed three soldiers on the ground, one of them scalped, his head much mangled, and his ears cut off, though not quite dead—a sight which struck the soldiers with horror. Captain Parsons marched on and joined the main body, who were only waiting for his coming up to march back to Boston. Colonel Smith had executed his orders, without opposition, by destroying all the military stores he could find. Both the Colonel and Major Pitcairn having taken all possible pains to convince the inhabitants that no injury was intended them, and that if they opened their doors when required, to search for said stores, not the slightest mischief should be done. Neither had any of the people the least occasion to complain; but they were sulky, and one of them even struck Major Pitcairn. Except upon Captain Laurie at the bridge, no hostilities happened from the affair at Lexington, until the Troops began their march back. As soon as the Troops had got out of the Town of Concord, they received a heavy fire on them from all sides—from walls, fences, houses, trees, barns, &c., which continued, without intermission, till they met the First Brigade, with two fieldpieces, near Lexington, ordered out under the command of Lord Percy to support them. Upon the firing of the field-pieces, the

258 | Primary Documents

people’s fire was for a while silenced; but as they still continued to increase greatly in numbers, they fired again, as before, from all places where they could find cover, upon the whole body, and continued so doing for the space of fifteen miles. Notwithstanding their numbers, they did not attack openly during the whole day, but kept under cover on all occasions. The Troops were very much fatigued; the greater part of them having been under arms all night, and made a march of upwards of forty miles before they arrived at Charlestown, from whence they were ferried over to Boston. The Troops had above fifty killed, and many more wounded; reports are various about the loss sustained by the country people; some make it very considerable, others not so much.

Guided by Massachusetts delegate John Adams, the Continental Congress unanimously elected a Virginian rather than a New Englander to command the army, hoping to engage Southern loyalties in a war that had so far been fought only in Massachusetts. George Washington accepted with reluctance, keenly aware of his limitations. His last military experience had been as a colonel of militia in the French and Indian War, in command of no more than one thousand men. Congress, meanwhile, having vested Washington with “ full power and authority,” acted to limit his authority at every turn.

Source: Richard Frothingham, History of the Siege of Boston (Boston: Little, Brown, 1873).

The resolutions being read, were adopted as follows:

6. Continental Congress Resolution Regarding the Continental Army and George Washington (1775) The Continental Congress had been in existence less than a year when it undertook the tasks of governing a nation and fighting one of the world’s great military powers. Having raised a rebel army, Massachusetts asked Congress to assume control of it. In establishing the Continental Army, Congress had to overcome widespread fear of military power. Many feared that the army and its new commander would become instruments of tyranny, as had occurred after successful revolutions of the past. The one-year term of enlistment served to limit the army’s power, but it also limited its ability to stay the course of a long war.

Resolution of the Continental Congress Adopting the Continental Army, June 14, 1775.

Resolved, That six companies of expert rifflemen, be immediately raised in Pensylvania, two in Maryland, and two in Virginia; that each company consist of a captain, three lieutenants, four serjeants, four corporals, a drummer or trumpeter, and sixty-eight privates. That each company, as soon as compleated, shall march and join the army near Boston, to be there employed as light infantry, under the command of the chief Officer in that army. That the pay of the Officers and privates be as follows, viz. a captain @ 20 dollars per month; a lieutenant 13 1/3 dollars; a serjeant @ 8 dollars; a corporal @a 7 1/3 dollars; drummer or [trumpeter] @ 7 1/3 doll.; privates @a 6 2/3 dollars; to find their own arms and cloaths. That the form of the enlistment be in the following words:

Primary Documents | 259



I have, this day, voluntarily enlisted myself, as a soldier, in the American continental army, for one year, unless sooner discharged: And I do bind myself to conform, in all instances, to such rules and regulations, as are, or shall be, established for the government of the said Army. Upon motion, Resolved, That Mr. [George] Washington, Mr. [Philip] Schuyler, Mr. [Silas] Deane, Mr. [Thomas] Cushing, and Mr. [Joseph] Hewes be a committee to bring in a draft of Rules and regulations for the government of the army. Resolution of the Continental Congress Appointing George Washington as Commander in Chief of the Continental Army, June 15, 1775. The report of the committee being read and debated, Resolved, That a General be appointed to command all the continental forces, raised, or to be raised, for the defence of American liberty. That five hundred dollars, per month, be allowed for his pay and expences. The Congress then proceeded to the choice of a general, by ballot, when George Washington, Esq. was unanimously elected. Washington’s Commission as Commander in Chief of the Continental Army, June 17, 1775. IN CONGRESS The delegates of the United Colonies of New Hampshire, Massachusetts bay, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pensylvania, the Counties of New-Castle,

Kent, and Sussex, on Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina: To George Washington, Esq. WE, reposing special trust and confidence in your patriotism, valor, conduct, and fidelity, do, by these presents, constitute and appoint you to be General and Commander in chief, of the army of the United Colonies, and of all the forces now raised, or to be raised, by them, and of all others who shall voluntarily offer their service, and join the said Army for the Defence of American liberty, and for repelling every hostile invasion thereof: And you are hereby vested with full power and authority to act as you shall think for the good and welfare of the service. And we do hereby strictly charge and require all Officers and Soldiers, under your command, to be obedient to your orders, and diligent in the exercise of their several duties. And we do also enjoin and require you, to be careful in executing the great trust reposed in you, by causing strict discipline and order to be observed in the army, and that the soldiers be duly exercised, and provided with all convenient necessaries. And you are to regulate your conduct in every respect by the rules and discipline of war, (as herewith given you,) and punctually to observe and follow such orders and directions, from time to time, as you shall receive from this, or a future Congress of these United Colonies, or committee of Congress. This commission to continue in force, until revoked by this, or a future Congress. By order of the Congress. Dated, Philadelphia, June 17, 1775. Source: Journals of the Continental Congress (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1904–1937).

260 | Primary Documents

7. Royal Proclamation Declaring the Colonies in Rebellion (1775) When news of the battles at Lexington, Concord, and Bunker Hill reached King George III, it cemented his resolve to suppress the rebellion by force. Meanwhile, members of the Continental Congress, hoping to avoid full-scale war, had prepared the Olive Branch Petition, the Americans’ final offer of reconciliation, and approved it on July 5, 1775. Congress sent the Loyalist Richard Penn to London bearing the petition, and he arrived in mid-August. However, the king refused to meet him or to accept and read the petition. George III issued this proclamation on August 23, 1775, the day that the American delegation had intended to present its petition. He declared that all who aided the rebellion were traitors to Great Britain and called for his loyal subjects to suppress the rebellion and bring the traitors to justice. When the Continental Congress received news of the proclamation in October, those delegates who had wished for reconciliation lost support, and Congress formally responded by rejecting the charge of treason and vowing retaliation in kind for any acts against American Patriots. Whereas many of our subjects in divers parts of our Colonies and Plantations in North America, misled by dangerous and ill designing men, and forgetting the allegiance which they owe to the power that has protected and supported them; after various disorderly acts committed in disturbance of the publick peace, to the obstruction of lawful commerce, and to the oppression of our loyal subjects carrying on the same; have at length proceeded to open and avowed rebellion, by arraying themselves in a hostile manner, to

withstand the execution of the law, and traitorously preparing, ordering and levying war against us: And whereas, there is reason to apprehend that such rebellion hath been much promoted and encouraged by the traitorous correspondence, counsels and comfort of divers wicked and desperate persons within this Realm: To the end therefore, that none of our subjects may neglect or violate their duty through ignorance thereof, or through any doubt of the protection which the law will afford to their loyalty and zeal, we have thought fit, by and with the advice of our Privy Council, to issue our Royal Proclamation, hereby declaring, that not only all our Officers, civil and military, are obliged to exert their utmost endeavours to suppress such rebellion, and to bring the traitors to justice, but that all our subjects of this Realm, and the dominions thereunto belonging, are bound by law to be aiding and assisting in the suppression of such rebellion, and to disclose and make known all traitorous conspiracies and attempts against us, our crown and dignity; and we do accordingly strictly charge and command all our Officers, as well civil as military, and all others our obedient and loyal subjects, to use their utmost endeavours to withstand and suppress such rebellion, and to disclose and make known all treasons and traitorous conspiracies which they shall know to be against us, our crown and dignity; and for that purpose, that they transmit to one of our principal Secretaries of State, or other proper officer, due and full information of all persons who shall be found carrying on correspondence with, or in any manner or degree aiding or abetting

Primary Documents | 261



the persons now in open arms and rebellion against our Government, within any of our Colonies and Plantations in North America, in order to bring to condign punishment the authors, perpetrators, and abetters of such traitorous designs. Given at our Court at St. James’s the twenty-third day of August, one thousand seven hundred and seventy-five, in the fifteenth year of our reign. GOD save the KING. Source: Peter Force, ed., American Archives: Fourth Series, vol. 3 (Washington, DC: M. St. Clair Clarke and Peter Force, 1840), 240–241.

8. Declaration of Independence (1776) The Continental Congress took the momentous and irrevocable step of severing ties with Great Britain when it began debating Richard Henry Lee’s resolution declaring independence on June 7, 1776. Congress then appointed a five-man committee— chaired by Thomas Jefferson and including John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman, and Robert Livingston—to draft a full version explaining the reasoning behind the action and the grievances that led to it. Jefferson did the initial drafting, and the document was subsequently debated and revised by Congress as a whole. Congress’s most notable revision was to delete a statement denouncing the slave trade. The resulting Declaration of Independence, adopted on July 4, 1776, aimed to persuade the colonists as well as other nations to support independence. John Hancock, the president of Congress, signed the declaration. Fifty more delegates added their signatures at the official signing ceremony on

August 2. Five more signed over the next several months. The delegates knew that by signing they risked being targeted for reprisal, as the declaration ended with the words “we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.” Indeed, British troops destroyed the home of one signer, Francis Lewis of New York, and imprisoned his wife, who died as a result. Congress ordered copies to be printed on posters and in newspapers and distributed and read to the state assemblies, the committees of safety, and the Continental Army. The Declaration of Independence met with widespread public approval. July 4, 1776 The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to

262 | Primary Documents

abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.—Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world. He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them. He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the

right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only. He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository or their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures. He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people. He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within. He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands. He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers. He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries. He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance. He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies, without the Consent of our legislatures. He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.



He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation: For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us: For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States: For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world: For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent: For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury: For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offenses: For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighboring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies: For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments: For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever. He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us. He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people. He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the

Primary Documents | 263

most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation. He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands. He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions. In every state of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people. Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends. We, Therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies,

264 | Primary Documents

solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally disolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor. [Signators] John Adams, Samuel Adams, Josiah Bartlett, Carter Braxton, Charles Carroll, Samuel Chase, Abraham Clark, George Clymer, William Ellery, William Floyd, Benjamin Franklin, Elbridge Gerry, Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, John Hancock, Benjamin Harrison, John Hart, Richard Henry Lee, Joseph Hewes, Thomas Heyward Jr., William Hooper, Stephen Hopkins, Francis Hopkinson, Samuel Huntington, Thomas Jefferson, Frans. Lewis, Francis Lightfoot Lee, Philip Livingston, Thomas Lynch Jr., Thomas McKean, Arthur Middleton, Lewis Morris, Robert Morris, John Morton, Thomas Nelson Jr., William Paca, John Penn, George Read, Caesar Rodney, George Ross, Benjamin Rush, Edward Rutledge, Roger Sherman, Jason Smith, Richard Stockton, Thomas Stone, George Taylor, Matthew Thornton, Robert Treat Paine, George Walton, William Whipple, William Williams, James Wilson, John Witherspoon, Oliver Wolcott, George Wythe. Source: Charters of Freedom, National Archives. https://www.loc.gov/item/2005616761/.

9. George Washington’s Letter to John Augustine Washington (1776) General George Washington had to maintain a public front of confidence to prevent Patriots from becoming too discouraged. He also did not want the British to perceive how desperate the American situation was. However, the private Washington often became deeply discouraged. At such times, he poured out his true feelings in letters to his brother John. December 18, 1776, found Washington in very low spirits. The campaign season had begun in New York in September. In the New York campaign, British general William Howe consistently outmaneuvered Washington and inflicted a series of embarrassing, punishing losses. Then the British had chased the rebel army hard through New Jersey. Washington had escaped across the Delaware River, leaving the British forces busy occupying important towns throughout New Jersey. Washington estimated that the British had 10,000 men, while his own army was reduced to 3,000. He worried that if the British pressed ahead he would be unable to defend the capital at Philadelphia. Congress had already fled to Baltimore, leaving Washington to do whatever he could to reverse the bleak situation. But Washington’s army was discouraged. The majority of his Continentals, the backbone of his small army, were likely to go home at the end of the year. As he explains to his brother, unless something surprising occurs, it appears that “the game is pretty near up.” Dear Brother: In the number of Letters I write, the recollection of any particular one is destroyed, but I think my last

Primary Documents | 265



to you was by Colo. Woodford from Hackensack. Since that period and a little before, our Affairs have taken an adverse turn but not more than was to be expected from the unfortunate Measures, which had been adopted for the establishment of our Army. The Retreat of the Enemys Army from the White Plains led me to think that they would turn their thoughts to the Jerseys, if no further, and induced me to cross the North River with some of the Troops, in order if possible to oppose them. I expected to have met at least 5000 Men of the Flying Camp and Militia; instead of which I found less than one half and no disposition in the Inhabitants to afford the least aid. This being perfectly well known to the Enemy, they threw over a large body of Troops, which pushed us from place to place till we were obliged to cross the Delaware with less than 3000 Men fit for duty owing to the dissolution of our force by short Inlistments; the Enemy’s numbers, from the best Accts. exceeding Ten and by some 12,000 Men. Before I removed to the South Side of the River, I had all the Boats, and other Vessels brought over, or destroyed from Philadelphia upwards for 70 Miles, and, by guarding the Fords have as yet, baffled all their attempts to cross. But, from some late movement of theirs, I am left in doubt whether they are moving off for Winter Quarters or making a feint to throw us off our guard. Since I came on this side, I have been join’d by about 2000 of the City Militia, and understand that some of the Country Militia (from the back Counties,) are on their way; but we are in a very disaffected part of the Provence, and between you and me, I think our Affairs are in a very bad situation; not so much from the apprehension of Genl.

Howe’s Army, as from the defection of New York, Jerseys, and Pensylvania. In short, the Conduct of the Jerseys has been most Infamous. Instead of turning out to defend their Country and affording aid to our Army, they are making their submissions as fast as they can. If they the Jerseys had given us any support, we might have made a stand at Hackensack and after that at Brunswick, but the few Militia that were in Arms, disbanded themselves and left the poor remains of our Army to make the best we could of it. I have no doubt but that General Howe will still make an attempt upon Philadelphia this Winter. I see nothing to oppose him a fortnight hence, as the time of all the Troops, except those of Virginia (reduced almost to nothing,) and Smallwood’s Regiment of Maryland, (equally as bad) will expire in less than that time. In a word my dear Sir, if every nerve is not strain’d to recruit the New Army with all possible expedition, I think the game is pretty near up, owing, in a great measure, to the insidious Arts of the Enemy, and disaffection of the Colonies before mentioned, but principally to the accursed policy of short Inlistments, and placing too great a dependence on the Militia the Evil consequences of which were foretold 15 Months ago with a spirit almost Prophetick. Before this reaches you, you will no doubt have heard of the Captivity of Genl. Lee; this is an additional misfortune, and the more vexatious, as it was by his own folly and Imprudence (and without a view to answer any good) he was taken, going three Miles out of his own Camp and with 20 of the Enemy to lodge, a rascally Tory rid in the Night to give notice of it to the Enemy who sent a party of light Horse that seized and carried him with every mark of triumph and indignity.

266 | Primary Documents

You can form no Idea of the perplexity of my Situation. No Man, I believe, ever had a greater choice of difficulties and less means to extricate himself from them. However under a full persuasion of the justice of our Cause I cannot entertain an Idea that it will finally sink tho’ it may remain for some time under a Cloud. My love, and sincere regards attend my Sister and the Family and Compliments to all enquiring friends. With every Sentiment of friendship, as well as love, I am etc. Source: George Washington to John Augustine Washington, December 18, 1776, in The Writings of George Washington, vol. 6, edited by John C. Fitzpatrick (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1932).

10. The American Crisis (1776) [Excerpts] Thomas Paine, born in England in 1737, had little formal education and had struggled all his working life to make a living. In 1772, he lost his job because he wrote a pamphlet arguing for higher pay. In desperate straits in London, he happened to meet Benjamin Franklin, who urged him to sail for America. On his arrival in Philadelphia in 1774, Paine quickly took up the revolutionary cause. He argued for independence from Great Britain in his most influential work, Common Sense, published as a pamphlet in January 1776. Paine accepted no payment for his best seller, instead donating all profits to the cause. In July 1776, Paine joined the Continental Army and took part in its harrowing winter retreat across New Jersey. His fellow soldiers’ endurance inspired Paine’s letter The American Crisis, which appeared in the Pennsylvania Journal on December 19, 1776. Beginning with the words “These

are the times that try men’s souls,” the letter rallied people to the revolutionary cause at a time when support was flagging. Paine followed that first letter with others in support of the revolution, and they appeared throughout the war until 1783. Paine wrote to lift the morale of General George Washington’s men fighting in the Continental Army. THESE are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as FREEDOM should not be highly rated. Britain, with an army to enforce her tyranny, has declared that she has a right (not only to TAX) but “to BIND us in ALL CASES WHATSOEVER,” and if being bound in that manner, is not slavery, then is there not such a thing as slavery upon earth. Even the expression is impious; for so unlimited a power can belong only to God. ’Tis surprising to see how rapidly a panic will sometimes run through a country. All nations and ages have been subject to them. Britain has trembled like an ague at the report of a French fleet of flat-bottomed boats; and in the fourteenth century the whole English army, after ravaging the



kingdom of France, was driven back like men petrified with fear; and this brave exploit was performed by a few broken forces collected and headed by a woman, Joan of Arc. Would that heaven might inspire some Jersey maid to spirit up her countrymen, and save her fair fellow sufferers from ravage and ravishment! Yet panics, in some cases, have their uses; they produce as much good as hurt. Their duration is always short; the mind soon grows through them, and acquires a firmer habit than before. But their peculiar advantage is, that they are the touchstones of sincerity and hypocrisy, and bring things and men to light, which might otherwise have lain forever undiscovered. In fact, they have the same effect on secret traitors, which an imaginary apparition would have upon a private murderer. They sift out the hidden thoughts of man, and hold them up in public to the world. Many a disguised Tory has lately shown his head, that shall penitentially solemnize with curses the day on which Howe arrived upon the Delaware. As I was with the troops at Fort Lee, and marched with them to the edge of Pennsylvania, I am well acquainted with many circumstances, which those who live at a distance know but little or nothing of. Our situation there was exceedingly cramped, the place being a narrow neck of land between the North River and the Hackensack. Our force was inconsiderable, being not one-fourth so great as Howe could bring against us. We had no army at hand to have relieved the garrison, had we shut ourselves up and stood on our defence. Our ammunition, light artillery, and the best part of our stores, had been removed, on the apprehension that Howe would endeavor to penetrate the Jerseys, in which case Fort Lee could be of no use to us; for it must occur to every thinking man, whether in the army or not,

Primary Documents | 267

that these kind of field forts are only for temporary purposes, and last in use no longer than the enemy directs his force against the particular object which such forts are raised to defend. . . . I shall not now attempt to give all the particulars of our retreat to the Delaware; suffice it for the present to say, that both officers and men, though greatly harassed and fatigued, frequently without rest, covering, or provision, the inevitable consequences of a long retreat, bore it with a manly and martial spirit. All their wishes centred in one, which was, that the country would turn out and help them to drive the enemy back. Voltaire has remarked that King William never appeared to full advantage but in difficulties and in action; the same remark may be made on General Washington, for the character fits him. There is a natural firmness in some minds which cannot be unlocked by trifles, but which, when unlocked, discovers a cabinet of fortitude; and I reckon it among those kind of public blessings, which we do not immediately see, that God hath blessed him with uninterrupted health, and given him a mind that can even flourish upon care. . . . I thank God, that I fear not. I see no real cause for fear. I know our situation well, and can see the way out of it. While our army was collected, Howe dared not risk a battle; and it is no credit to him that he decamped from the White Plains, and waited a mean opportunity to ravage the defenceless Jerseys; but it is great credit to us, that, with a handful of men, we sustained an orderly retreat for near an hundred miles, brought off our ammunition, all our field pieces, the greatest part of our stores, and had four rivers to pass. None can say that our retreat was precipitate, for we were near three weeks in performing it, that the country might have time to come

268 | Primary Documents

in. Twice we marched back to meet the enemy, and remained out till dark. The sign of fear was not seen in our camp, and had not some of the cowardly and disaffected inhabitants spread false alarms through the country, the Jerseys had never been ravaged. Once more we are again collected and collecting; our new army at both ends of the continent is recruiting fast, and we shall be able to open the next campaign with sixty thousand men, well armed and clothed. This is our situation, and who will may know it. By perseverance and fortitude we have the prospect of a glorious issue; by cowardice and submission, the sad choice of a variety of evils—a ravaged country—a depopulated city—habitations without safety, and slavery without hope—our homes turned into barracks and bawdyhouses for Hessians, and a future race to provide for, whose fathers we shall doubt of. Look on this picture and weep over it! and if there yet remains one thoughtless wretch who believes it not, let him suffer it unlamented. Source: Thomas Paine, The American Crisis (No. 1). Courtesy of An American Time Capsule: Three Centuries of Broadsides and Other Printed Ephemera, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.

11. Benjamin Rush to Patrick Henry (1778) Benjamin Rush, best known for his role in medical education, was born near Philadelphia and trained as a physician at Princeton and in Britain. He returned to Philadelphia in 1769 and quickly became an avid Patriot. A delegate to the Continental Congress and one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, Rush then joined the Continental Army as a surgeon.

In 1777, George Washington’s army endured a string of defeats, while General Horatio Gates commanded a stunning American victory at Saratoga. Rush, who had once admired Washington, came to believe that Washington’s generalship imperiled the American cause, and he wrote this letter to suggest that Washington be replaced by Gates or another general. Rush sent it, unsigned, to Patrick Henry, then governor of Virginia. Henry quickly forwarded the letter to Washington, who recognized Rush’s handwriting and confronted him. Rush resigned from the army shortly thereafter, which he had been planning on doing because of his despair over the shortcomings of the medical service. Rush’s unsigned letter contributed to the perception that there was a plot against Washington, popularly called the Conway Cabal, after another disaffected officer, General Thomas Conway. Yorktown, January 12, 1778 Dear Sir, The common danger of our country first brought you and me together. I recollect with pleasure the influence of your conversation and eloquence upon the opinions of this country in the beginning of the present controversy. You first taught us to shake off our idolatrous attachment to royalty, and to oppose its encroachments upon our liberties with our very lives. By these means you saved us from ruin. The independence of America is the offspring of that liberal spirit of thinking and acting which followed the destruction of the specters of kings and the mighty power of Great Britain. But, sir, we have only passed the Red Sea. A dreary wilderness is still before us, and unless a Moses or a Joshua are raised up in our behalf, we must perish before we



reach the promised land. We have nothing to fear from our enemies on the way. General Howe, it is true, has taken Philadelphia; but he has only changed his prison. His dominions are bounded on all sides by his outsentries. America can only be undone by herself. She looks up to her councils and arms for protection, but alas! what are they? Her representation in Congress dwindled to only twenty-one members. Her Adams, her Wilson, her Henry, are no more among them. Her counsels weak, and partial remedies applied constantly for universal diseases. Her army—what is it? A major general belonging to it called it a few days ago in my hearing a mob. Discipline unknown, or wholly neglected. The quartermaster’s and commissaries’ departments filled with idleness and ignorance and peculation. Our hospitals crowded with 6000 sick but half provided with necessaries or accommodations, and more dying in them in one month than perished in the field during the whole of the last campaign. The money depreciating without any effectual measures being taken to raise it. The country distracted with the Don Quixotte attempts to regulate the prices of provision; an artificial famine created by it and a real one dreaded from it. The spirit of the people failing through a more intimate acquaintance with the causes of our misfortunes— many submitting daily to General Howe, and more wishing to do it only to avoid the calamities which threaten our country. But is our case desperate? By no means. We have wisdom, virtue, and strength enough to save us if they could be called into action. The northern army has shown us what Americans are capable of doing with a GENERAL at their head. The spirit of the southern army is no ways inferior to the spirit of the northern. A Gates, a Lee, or a Conway would in a few weeks render

Primary Documents | 269

them an irresistible body of men. The last of the above officers has accepted of the new office of inspector general of our army in order to reform abuses. But the remedy is only a palliative one. In one of his letters to a friend he says, “A great and good God hath decreed America to be free, or the [General] and weak counselors would have ruined her long ago.” You may rest assured of each of the facts related in this letter. The author of it is one of your Philadelphia friends. A hint of his name, if found out by the handwriting, must not be mentioned to your most intimate friend. Even the letter must be thrown in the fire. But some of its contents ought to be made public in order to awaken, enlighten, and alarm our country. I rely upon your prudence and am, dear sir, with my usual attachment to you and to our beloved independence, yours sincerely. Source: Jared Sparks, The Writings of George Washington, vol. 5 (Boston: Russell, Odiorne, and Metcalf, 1834), 495–497.

12. British Southern Strategy (1779) The British plan to reconquer the southern colonies had an important political component. Lord George Germain wanted to show the rebels that after they yielded, the British government would restore civil government to roughly the prewar colonial arrangements. In other words, there would be no military rule. On March 31, Governor James Wright was on the verge of sailing for Savannah to serve as the first British governor to resume civil authority in a reconquered colony. Germain’s instructions to Wright reflected a new British strategy. Georgia was to serve as a model for the other colonies. Germain hoped that the rebels would decide that life

270 | Primary Documents

in Georgia under British civil rule was better than continuing the war. Along with this political component, the new strategy had a military side, as shown in Germain’s letter on the same date to Clinton. Georgia was also to serve as a base, a stepping-stone, for the British to move north and secure South Carolina. This is the so-called southern strategy, a gradual spread of British control moving state by state from Georgia northward. So it was that the last years of the war focused on Georgia, the Carolinas, and eventually Virginia. Lord George Germain to General Sir Henry Clinton 31 March, Whitehall Sir, the recovery of South Carolina, is conceived here to be an object of so great importance that, should Lieut.-Colonel Campbell find himself too weak to effect it this spring, it is hoped you will be able to send such a force there in the winter as will be sufficient to reduce Charles Town and, cooperating with the troops in Georgia, obtain possession of the province. The assistance of the loyal inhabitants is essential to the success of all operations within land, and that is most likely to be obtained by the negotiations of persons well known to them and in whom they have confidence; and it is equally necessary, to avoid being deceived in our expectations from them, that our information should come through persons whose knowledge of the country and people enable them to detect and prevent imposition. On these accounts I thought it proper to send out to Georgia such of the King’s servants in Carolina as are well acquainted with the back inhabitants and had extensive influence among them before the rebellion, and directed

them to cultivate a correspondence with such as upon whose representation the greatest reliance might be had and convey to them the strongest assurance of protection and support in their endeavours to restore the constitution. Mr Simpson, who had been sometime attorney-general of South Carolina and served in the Assembly for a district in the back country, appears to me the most capable of executing every part of this service, and actuated by the most laudable motives he has very readily undertaken it. He goes out to Georgia in the Experiment man-ofwar and I have directed him to continue in that province, if he finds Lieut.-Colonel Campbell has relinquished the intention of attacking South Carolina, until he shall be repossessed of full information respecting the disposition and resolution of the back inhabitants and settled some plan with them for cooperating with the King’s troops when Charles Town shall be attacked; and when he has done this, to proceed to New York and lay the whole before you. He will, therefore, have the honour to deliver to you this letter and I need only add that I beg leave to recommend him to you as a gentleman worthy of entire confidence and with whom you may without reserve converse upon the subject and give the fullest credit to his representations. Lord George Germain to Governor Sir James Wright 31 March, Whitehall Sir, the King’s forces under the command of Major-General Prevost and Lieut.-Colonel Campbell having happily succeeded in subduing the rebels in Georgia and recovering that province to His Majesty’s obedience, it is the King’s wish that his faithful subjects there should as speedily as possible be



restored to the enjoyment of the blessings of civil government under their former legal constitution; and it was with this view that, as soon as the success of the King’s forces was known here, I received His Majesty’s commands to signify to you his royal pleasure that you should return without delay to that province and take upon you the exercise of your office of governor and summon all the other officers of the Crown to attend you. There is great reason to expect that upon your arrival you will find the military operations advanced into Carolina and the ferment of the late hostilities so entirely subsided in Georgia that nothing will be wanting to complete the public tranquillity but the declaration of His Majesty’s commissioners putting at the peace of the King. That declaration has accordingly been made by their Excellencies; but lest some unforeseen unfortunate events should have taken place, and that the circumstances of the province should have undergone such a change since the last advices came away so to render it unfit to promulge it, the declaration is confided to you and you will use your own discretion in publishing or withholding it as shall appear to you to be most for His Majesty’s service. In the hope, however, that the circumstances of the province will be such as to induce you to publish it, and that no obstacle will be found to stand in the way of the reestablishment of civil government, I shall point out to you such objects for your immediate attention to appear to me in a particular manner to deserve it. The state of the Council is first to be considered. It is most essential to the King’s service and the public welfare that the loyalty of that body should be pure and firm and uncontaminated by any member who has swerved from his duty. It has therefore been judged proper to dissolve the present

Primary Documents | 271

Council by an additional instruction from His Majesty which you will receive herewith in order to have the appointment of the whole open to you, and it is the King’s express command that you do not admit any who have not given full assurance of their loyalty and attachment to the constitution, although they have been heretofore appointed by His Majesty, but that you do call to the Council so many others of the principal inhabitants or officers of the Crown of whose loyalty and attachment to the constitution there can be no doubt as, with such of the present members as you shall think fit to be continued, shall complete the number of twelve. The calling an Assembly ought not to be delayed after the province is put at the King’s peace, that the inhabitants of all the provinces may see it is now the intention of His Majesty in Parliament to govern America by military law, but on the contrary to allow them all the benefits of a local legislature and their former civil constitution. It is impossible to say what measures will be fit to be proposed to the first Assembly, for none should be proposed that there is any likelihood of being rejected or occasioning disagreement or altercation between the different branches of the legislature. Your knowledge therefore of the temper and disposition of the members will be your best guide in this case, but whatever is effected for the purpose of chastisement ought to appear to come from themselves. The abrogating and annulling all laws and pretended legal proceedings since the abolition of legal government must of course be the object of a declaratory Act. The arming the executive authority with sufficient powers to check and prevent disaffection and rebellion in future will I hope be judged proper for another, and that the making reparation for the injuries and

272 | Primary Documents

losses sustained by loyal subjects during the rebellion will become the object of a third. The making a permanent provision for the provincial expense and fixing a ratio for the contribution of Georgia to the general charge of the empire would be no more than suitable returns for the generosity of Parliament in relinquishing all purpose of imposing taxes in the colonies; and should Georgia take the lead in so dutiful and grateful a measure, it could not fail of recommending the province to peculiar favour and obtaining for her some extraordinary indulgence. Should you find the Assembly disposed to take such a step, as an encouragement to them to proceed you may assure them that His Majesty will most graciously consent to remit the arrears of the quit-rents and it is His Majesty’s intention to apply their future produce and also the casual revenue to public services within the province. It may be expected that if the rebellion continues numbers of loyal subjects will be come into Georgia from the revolted provinces who may be desirous of becoming settlers. To all such it is the King’s pleasure you should make gratuitous allotments of land of such extent as you and the Council shall think sufficient for each of their accommodation subject to the usual condition; but you will take especial care to avoid being mistaken in regard to the persons to whom you shall make such allotments, and to prevent any but loyal subjects from obtaining or being benefited by them. When you are upon the spot you will be able to form an opinion what improvements or alterations in the former constitution would be acceptable to the people as tending more firmly to unite the province with Great Britain and to render that union indissoluble, and I must desire you will state fully to me in your correspondence what

you may collect to be their wishes upon this important subject. I shall at present only add my wishes for your prosperous voyage and safe arrival. Source: UK National Archives, Records of the Colonial Office, C.O. 5/97, fo. 144 and C.O. 5/665, fo. 199. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

13. Impact of the West Indies on British Strategy (1779) The West Indies were commercially more important to Great Britain than were the 13 rebellious colonies. After France entered the war on the rebel side, British strategists had to divide resources among the North American command and the West Indies. In 1779, General Henry Clinton received only such reinforcements as Britain could spare from elsewhere. In his letter of April 1, 1779, Lord George Germain made a series of proposals to General Henry Clinton regarding the future conduct of the war. Most notable, Germain proposed the idea that troops could be shuttled between New York and the West Indies. This proved to be a thoroughly impractical suggestion. Troops sent to the West Indies became weak and depleted from disease. Commanders in the West Indies believed that they could not spare any troops to send to Clinton. The navy could not reliably transport men back and forth. Consequently, Clinton would receive very few reinforcements for the 1779 campaign as he embarked on an ambitious strategy to conquer the southern colonies. For the campaign of 1779, both France and Great Britain focused considerable resources on the West Indies. Admiral d’Estaing’s French fleet departed Boston

Primary Documents | 273



for the West Indies on November 4, 1778. On the same day, Admiral Hotham departed New York for the West Indies in company with a 5,800-man detachment from Clinton’s army. They were soldiers whom Clinton could ill afford to spare. Lord George Germain to General Sir Henry Clinton 1 April, Whitehall Sir, Lieutenant Beckinoe of the navy who arrived here in the Diana victualler delivered to me your dispatches Nos. 40 and 41 the 7th of last month, and on the 29th I received that of the 17th February by Colonel Fox, and I had the honour to lay them before the King; and I have the satisfaction to acquaint you that although, as you will have seen by my letter No. 25 His Majesty was already informed of the success of the attack upon Georgia, His Majesty very much approved the attention you showed in transmitting so speedily that agreeable intelligence. The embarkation returns of the troops now going to you which are enclosed do not make the number of recruits amount to what I told you was intended to be sent with this convoy; but as there are sufficient to complete all the British regiments with you and at Rhode Island to their establishment by your last returns, I was unwilling to delay the sailing of the fleet until those could be brought from Ireland which are intended for the augmentation, or more of the German recruits should arrive. The remainder will, however, be sent as soon as they can be collected and proper convoy can be afforded. Besides the reinforcement which goes from hence, it is His Majesty’s intention to comply with your wishes and still further increase your force by returning to you the whole of that fine body of men you sent

under Major-General Grant to the West Indies so soon as the season for offensive operations there is over; and that no time may be lost I have dispatched orders to Major-General Grant that, if no event happens that may afford a prospect of employing the troops with advantage in offensive operations before the approach of the hurricane season, he do return to New York or whatever part of the continent of America you shall direct him to come to with all he thinks may be spared after providing for the security and defence of St Lucie and the other West India islands during the season in which it is unfit to carry on any offensive operations, taking into his consideration that it is always intended the British fleet upon that station shall be superior to the French; and it is the King’s intention that such part of his detachment as he shall leave behind should be relieved by the 3rd and 4th battalions of the Royal American regiment and the three companies of the second now in the Floridas, who are accustomed to a warm climate and less likely to suffer by the heat of the West Indies. You will therefore immediately order as many of the companies of those battalions as you can collect and provide a conveyance for with convoy to proceed to the Leeward Islands before the hurricane season, General Grant having directions to leave the proper orders (in case he should be come away before they arrive) for making the exchanges and sending back the relieved troops to New York or wherever you shall order them, and it is expected you will be able to supply the place of the Royal Americans in the Floridas by detachments of the new or of the corps now going out. It is not, however, His Majesty’s purpose to relinquish the idea of further attempts upon the enemy’s possessions in the West Indies if the war continues; but it is proposed such attacks should be made by

274 | Primary Documents

detachments from North America in the winter season and the troops, except garrisons, to be brought back when the service is over. The commanders of the King’s ships upon both stations will have orders to furnish convoys and act conjunctly in the execution of this plan. I am glad to find by the accounts I have received from Nova Scotia that the province has not been disturbed by any eruptions of the rebels during the winter, and as the Indians on St John’s have renounced their alliances with the Congress and attached themselves to our interests, there is little reason to apprehend attacks from that quarter in future. It was also with great pleasure I learnt that the troops there were in high health and excellent order and in perfect readiness to enter upon action whenever your commands for their employment should arrive. If my information be right the people of the Massachusetts Bay draw their supplies of naval stores, timber, masts, and even firewood, from the province of Main and the seacoast is almost everywhere accessible and the rivers and inlets from St John’s River to Piscataway without any materials works to defend them. The post intended to be established at Penobscot, by affording a place of secure retreat to the troops and ships, would very much facilitate the execution of any plan you might think fit to adopt for reducing and keeping possession of the seacoasts of this country by a detachment of the troops at Nova Scotia; and if the St John’s Indians could be prevailed upon to act at the same time within land and a cooperation was carried on from the side of Canada, I should think the measure could not fail of being attended with great advantage to the King’s service and of increasing that distress of the rebellious inhabitants of the New England provinces which I fear is the only means of making

them sensible of the ruinous consequences of their attempts at independency and inducing them to return to their allegiance. The King is very anxious to hear you have been able to recover the convention troops in the way you proposed by exchanging them as prisoners of war, as it is His Majesty’s intention to reinforce the army in Canada with those corps as soon as they are released. Whenever therefore you shall have effected their exchange, you will embark them on board of transports and send them to Quebec under such convoy as the Admiral shall think proper to appoint as sufficient for their protection. The King having settled the staff for North America, the following officers will receive letters of service as majors-general, vizt. Mathew, Smith, Prevost, Leslie, Erskine, Campbell, and Pattison of the artillery. MajorGeneral Robertson, being appointed governor of New York, will also be continued on the staff in such manner as to prevent his being commanded within his government by a junior officer but he is not to roll with the army or have any command beyond the limits of his government. Major-General Vaughan will therefore be second to you in the field, and to enable him to take the command of the army in case of your death His Majesty has been pleased to sign a commission appointing him a general in America to be produced only upon such an event happening. PS. As the security of the Bahama Islands is from their situation of great importance for the protection of our trade, His Majesty thinks it proper that Governor Browne should remain in his government and not return to the continent of America without resigning his commission of governor. Source: UK National Archives, C.O. 5/97, fo. 146. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

Primary Documents | 275



14. Prison Narrative of Ebenezer Fox (1779) [Excerpt] Ebenezer Fox was a sailor on a Massachusetts vessel captured by the British during the ill-fated Penobscot expedition of 1779. He was imprisoned on the Jersey, one of the war’s notorious prison hulks. The Jersey stood aground in mudflats just off the coast of British-occupied Long Island. After the New York City fire of 1776, the British had few buildings in which to house prisoners of war, so they used outdated, unseaworthy warships. Based on the 1808 excavation of the mass graves along the shore, it was estimated that more than 11,000 men died on the British prison hulks of New York. Lack of sanitation, abundance of vermin, overcrowding, and starvation rations drove the death toll upward. Each night the prisoners were confined belowdecks, and each morning the newly dead were brought up. So squalid were the conditions on these deathtraps that prisoners would do almost anything to escape. Those who could swim might reach Long Island, but they stood little chance of escaping detection by a British sympathizer. Fox did not have the good fortune to participate in one of the bolder escapes described here. Prisoners had to weigh the likelihood of death in prison against the chance of survival if they enlisted in the enemy army. Fox chose to enlist in the British Army for service in the West Indies, from where he eventually escaped. Fox began writing his wartime memoir at the age of 75 and published it in 1838. All the filth that accumulated among upwards of a thousand men was daily thrown overboard, and would remain there till carried away by the tide. The

impurity of the water may be easily conceived; and in this water our meat was boiled. It will be recollected too that the water was salt, which caused the inside of the copper to become corroded to such a degree that it was lined with a coat of verdigris. Meat thus cooked must in some degree be poisoned; and the effects of it were manifest in the cadaverous countenances of the emaciated beings, who had remained on board for any length of time. The persons, chosen by each Mess to receive their portions of food, were summoned by the cook’s bell to receive their allowance, and, when it had remained in the boiler a certain time, the bell would again sound, and the allowance must be immediately taken away; whether it was sufficiently cooked, or not, it could remain no longer. The food was generally very imperfectly cooked; yet this sustenance, wretched as it was, and deficient in quantity, was greedily devoured by the half-starved prisoners. No vegetables were allowed us. Many times since, when I have seen in the country, a large kettle of potatoes and pumpkins steaming over the fire to satisfy the appetites of a farmer’s swine, I have thought of our destitute and starved conditions, and what a luxury we should have considered the contents of that kettle on board the Jersey. The prisoners were confined in the two main decks below. The lowest dungeon was inhabited by those prisoners who were foreigners, and whose treatment was more severe than that of the Americans. The inhabitants of this lower region were the most miserable and disgusting-looking objects that can be conceived. Daily washing with salt water, together with their extreme emaciation, caused their skin to

276 | Primary Documents

appear like dried parchment. Many of them remained unwashed for weeks; their hair long and matted, and filled with vermin; their beards never cut, excepting occasionally with a pair of shears, which did not improve their comeliness, though it might add to their comfort. Their clothes were mere rags, secured to their bodies in every way that ingenuity could devise. Many of these men had been in this lamentable condition for two years, part of the time on board other prison-ships; and, having given up all hope of ever being exchanged, had become resigned to their situation. These men were foreigners, whose whole lives had been one continual scene of toil, hardship, and suffering. Their feelings were blunted, their dispositions soured; they had no sympathies for the world; no home to mourn for; no friends to lament for their fate. But far different was the condition of the most numerous class of the prisoners, composed mostly of young men from NewEngland fresh from home. They had reason to deplore the sudden change in their condition. The thoughts of home, of parents, brothers, sisters, and friends, would crown upon their minds; and, “brooding on they had been, and what they were, their desire for home became a madness.” The dismal and disgusting scene around; the wretched objects continually in sight, and “hope deferred, which maketh the heart sick,” produced a state of melancholy, that often ended in death—the death of a broken heart. . . . In the morning, the prisoners were permitted to ascend the upper deck, to spend the day, till ordered below at sunset. A certain number, who were for the time called the “Working Party,” performed in rotation the duty of bringing up the hammocks and bedding for airing, likewise the sick and

infirm, and the bodies of those who had died during the night: of these there were generally a number every morning. After these services, it was their duty to wash the decks. Our beds and clothing were allowed to remain on deck till we were ordered below for the night; this was of considerable benefit, as it gave some of the vermin an opportunity to migrate from the quarters they had inhabited. About two hours before sun-set, orders were given to the prisoners to carry all their things below; but we were permitted to remain above till we retired for the night into our unhealthy and crowded dungeons. At sun-set, our ears were saluted with the insulting and hateful sound from our keepers, of “Down, rebels, down,” and we were hurried below, the hatchways fastened over us, and we were left to pass the night amid the accumulated horrors of sighs and groans, of foul vapor, a nauseous and putrid atmosphere, in a stifled and almost suffocating heat. The tiers of holes through the sides of the ship were strongly grated, but not provided with glass; and it was considered a privilege to sleep near one of these apertures in hot weather for the pure air that passed in at them. But little sleep however could be enjoyed even there; for the vermin were so horribly abundant, that all the personal cleanliness we could practise would not protect us from their attacks, or prevent their effecting a lodgement upon us. When any of the prisoners died in the night, their bodies were brought to the upper deck in the morning, and placed upon the gratings. If the deceased had owned a blanket, any prisoner might sew it around the corpse, and then it was lowered with a rope, tied round the middle, down the side of the ship into a boat. Some of the prisoners were allowed to go on shore, under a



guard, to perform the labor of interment. Having arrived on shore, they found in a small hut some tools for diggin, and a handbarrow on which the body was conveyed to the place for burial. Here in a bank near the Wallabout, a hole was excavated in the sand, in which the body was put, and then slightly covered; the guard not giving time sufficient to perform this melancholy service in a faithful manner. Many bodies would, in a few days after this mockery of a burial, be exposed nearly bare by the action of the elements. . . . This was the last resting place of many a son and brother; young and noble-spirited men, who had left their happy homes and kind friends to offer their lives in the service of their country; but they little thought of such a termination to their active career, they had not expected to waste their energies in this dreadful prison. . . . It was a painful task for the prisoners to carry, to this unconsecrated burial place, the bodies of those who had been their companions for months perhaps, and who were endeared to them by their love for the same glorious cause, and the same feeling of resentment toward their unmanly oppressors. The fate of many of these unhappy victims must have remained forever unknown to their friends; for, in so large a number, no exact account could be kept of those who died, and they rested in a nameless grave; while those, who performed the last sad rites, were hurried away before their task was half completed, and forbidden to express their horror and indignation at this insulting negligence toward the dead. But the emotions, thus suppressed, only glowed the more intensely within their bosoms, and contributed as much as any other cause to keep alive the hatred and animosity toward their enemies.

Primary Documents | 277 Source: Charles Fox, The Revolutionary Adventures of Ebenezer Fox, of Roxbury, Massachusetts (Boston: Munroe and Francis, 1838), 103–114.

15. Congressional Report on Morristown (1780) The Continental Army’s sufferings during the winter of 1777–1778 at Valley Forge are well remembered. Less known is the even worse experience endured by the army at Morristown during the winter of 1779–1780. On November 30, 1779, George Washington ordered the main army to march to Morristown to enter winter quarters. Washington chose Morristown because several ranges of hills stood between it and the British army in New York City, and these hills offered a protective barrier. The soldiers faced a hard march in cold weather to reach Morristown. Once they arrived, they built more than 1,000 log huts for shelter. Most of the soldiers camped in Jockey Hollow, three miles southwest of Morristown. The remainder of the winter featured record-breaking cold. The commissariat failed again. Between 10,000 and 12,000 soldiers faced death from cold and starvation. January almost broke the army when Massachusetts and New Jersey regiments mutinied to protest their neglect. A congressional committee visited Morristown in the spring of 1780 and reported to the president of Congress on what it found. As the three committee members wrote, “Before we had an opportunity closely to view and examine into the real state of things, we had no conception of the almost inextricable difficulties in which we found them involved.” The committee also warned that the soldiers might mutiny again.

278 | Primary Documents

Sir, The necessary enquiries at the posts on the communication from Philadelphia hither, and the heavy rains that fell, retarded our Journey so much, that we did not reach this place untill the 28th Ulto. Judging it advisable to inform ourselves, as fully as possible on the general subject of our Mission, before we attempted an alteration in any of the departments, We held conferences with the Commander in Chief for several days succeeding our arrival the result of which was, that the distressed state of the army in point of provisions should claim our immediate attention to the arrangement of the two great staff departments, so as to adapt them to securing and bringing on the supplies called for from the several states by the act of the 25th of February last. Systems for both have been attempted and some progress made therein. We find little difficulty in establishing one, for receiving, securing, and issuing, and properly accounting for, the expenditure of supplies to be furnished by the states. But, embarrassments of a serious nature arose, through a want of money on the one hand, to pay for the transportation thereof, a want of forage on the other, in those states which are not called on to furnish any and in which the Continental officers are probably inhibited from purchasing, as they are in this state, and where the quota of that article is already expended, at the same time that the state Officers cannot go beyond quantities assigned them. And yet, a vast land transportation must of necessity take place, in and through states, under either predicament. The impracticability of conveying Forage from states remotely situated is too evident to require any comments on our parts. Hence, unless the states are requested to repeal so much of their laws as prohibit the Continental Officers from making

purchases whenever Congress, or some superintending board, or Military Commander, shall judge it necessary, the public service must inevitably be retarded, if not totally stagnated. Nor should the repeal be confined to a mere permission for procuring forage, but be extended to every enumerated article under the restrictions mentioned. For it is beyond a doubt that case will arise in which the army will be unsupplied in particular states, when the quotas of such state have been expended, And those of others not only so remote as to afford little prospect of immediate relief, but too much so to draw the supplies from thence, on any principle of oeconomy, if they could be got at hand, as the mere charge of transportation would greatly increase the prime cost. But the repeals we have stated to be necessary are not alone sufficient, for unless money is immediately furnished to pay for the transportation of supplies from the different magazines in hired carriages, and to redeem the public working cattle which the farmers in every quarter hold in pledge for the payment of their subsistence through the winter, every plan of supply must prove nugatory, and all we have done, or can do, relative to the arrangement of those departments, will be inadequate to the great object. Indeed such are the accumulated distresses of the army at this conjuncture, and such the effects of a repetition of want, that it has had a very pernicious influence on the soldiery. Their patience is exhausted, by being exposed to such frequent sufferings, that they already begin to ascribe to a defect of resources what they have hitherto been taught to believe arose from accidental impediment. Their starving condition, Their want of pay, and the variety of hardships they have been driven to sustain, has soured their tempers, and produced a spirit of discontent which begins to display itself



under a complexion of the most alarming hue. If this spirit should fully establish itself, it must be productive of some violent convulsion, infinitely to our prejudice, at home, and abroad, as it would evince a want of means, or a want of wisdom to apply them. Either of which must bring our cause into discredit and draw in its train consequences of a nature too serious to be contemplated without the deepest anxiety. Permit us therefore to intreat the immediate attention of Congress to this necessary supply, for the purpose we have mentioned. And, for the payment of the troops, to whom the paymaster is now greatly in arrears, and the Officers so entirely destitute, that many for want of their subsistence money, with which they made some addition to their single rations, are now reduced to the disagreeable necessity of making it their whole support. On examining into the state of provisions in Camp we find there is not more meat than will last untill the 12th Inst. Collo. Blane is come up, and we have from him, that he has no prospect of an immediate supply of this article. The only resource we can turn our eyes to in this exigency is, the state of Pennsylvania. If they fail to make instantaneous exertions for the relief of the army—We will not pretend to say, what may be the event! Before we had an opportunity closely to view and examine into the real state of things, we had no conception of the almost inextricable difficulties in which we found them involved. We have stated matters plainly. We have been impelled to it [by] every consideration of Duty, by the sincere desire we have to fulfill the views and expectations of Congress, in our appointment, and by the principles of unbounded affection for our Country. These will lead us to every

Primary Documents | 279

exertion and without a moments delay [or remission], to lop of[f] every exuberancy which can be effected without material injury. We have omitted observing that the Medical departments are destitute of those necessaries which are indispensable for the sick. They have neither wine, Tea, sugar, Coffee, Chocolate, or spirits. We wish orders may be given for an immediate supply as the army grow more sickly every hour. Inclosed is a Copy of a letter from the Commissaries Genl. of purchases and Issues, to the Commander in Chief. We have the Honour to be, Sir, with the highest Respect Yr. most Obedt. Servts. P SCHUYLER JNO. MATHEWS NATHL. PEABODY Source: Edmund C. Burnett, Letters of Members of the Continental Congress, vol. 5 (Washington, DC: Carnegie Institution of Washington, 1931).

16. Treaty of Paris (1783) Word of Lord Charles Cornwallis’s October 19, 1781, surrender at Yorktown reached London on November 25. In March 1782, Parliament passed a resolution permitting the king to declare a truce. Britain now had to negotiate a peace with not only the United States but also France, Spain, and Holland. The American peace commissioners, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, John Jay, and Henry Laurens, received instructions from Congress to “be guided by the wishes of the French court” as they conducted negotiations from Paris.

280 | Primary Documents

British officials first approached Franklin about a peace treaty in April 1782. A preliminary treaty was signed by representatives from both nations on November 30, 1782. It granted to the fledgling United States nearly everything it wanted. The formal cessation of hostilities took effect on January 20, 1783. After an interval in which France and Great Britain concluded their own peace negotiations, the final Treaty of Paris was signed on September 3, 1783, and officially brought a close to the American Revolution, with Great Britain recognizing the colonies’ independence. The bulk of the British Army left American soil, departing New York in November 1783. The Continental Congress ratified the Treaty of Paris on January 14, 1784. Britain also signed separate treaties with the United States’ allies, France and Spain. In the name of the most holy and undivided Trinity. It having pleased the Divine Providence to dispose the hearts of the most serene and most potent Prince George the Third, by the grace of God, king of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, defender of the faith, duke of Brunswick and Lunebourg, archtreasurer and prince elector of the Holy Roman Empire etc., and of the United States of America, to forget all past misunderstandings and differences that have unhappily interrupted the good correspondence and friendship which they mutually wish to restore, and to establish such a beneficial and satisfactory intercourse, between the two countries upon the ground of reciprocal advantages and mutual convenience as may promote and secure to both perpetual peace and harmony; and having for this desirable end already laid the foundation of peace and reconciliation by the Provisional

Articles signed at Paris on the 30th of November 1782, by the commissioners empowered on each part, which articles were agreed to be inserted in and constitute the Treaty of Peace proposed to be concluded between the Crown of Great Britain and the said United States, but which treaty was not to be concluded until terms of peace should be agreed upon between Great Britain and France and his Britannic Majesty should be ready to conclude such treaty accordingly; and the treaty between Great Britain and France having since been concluded, his Britannic Majesty and the United States of America, in order to carry into full effect the Provisional Articles above mentioned, according to the tenor thereof, have constituted and appointed, that is to say his Britannic Majesty on his part, David Hartley, Esqr., member of the Parliament of Great Britain, and the said United States on their part, John Adams, Esqr., late a commissioner of the United States of America at the court of Versailles, late delegate in Congress from the state of Massachusetts, and chief justice of the said state, and minister plenipotentiary of the said United States to their high mightinesses the States General of the United Netherlands; Benjamin Franklin, Esqr., late delegate in Congress from the state of Pennsylvania, president of the convention of the said state, and minister plenipotentiary from the United States of America at the court of Versailles; John Jay, Esqr., late president of Congress and chief justice of the state of New York, and minister plenipotentiary from the said United States at the court of Madrid; to be plenipotentiaries for the concluding and signing the present definitive treaty; who after having reciprocally communicated their respective full powers have agreed upon and confirmed the following articles.



Article 1: His Brittanic Majesty acknowledges the said United States, viz., New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, to be free sovereign and independent states, that he treats with them as such, and for himself, his heirs, and successors, relinquishes all claims to the government, propriety, and territorial rights of the same and every part thereof. Article 2: And that all disputes which might arise in future on the subject of the boundaries of the said United States may be prevented, it is hereby agreed and declared, that the following are and shall be their boundaries, viz.; from the northwest angle of Nova Scotia, viz., that angle which is formed by a line drawn due north from the source of St. Croix River to the highlands; along the said highlands which divide those rivers that empty themselves into the river St. Lawrence, from those which fall into the Atlantic Ocean, to the northwesternmost head of Connecticut River; thence down along the middle of that river to the forty-fifth degree of north latitude; from thence by a line due west on said latitude until it strikes the river Iroquois or Cataraquy; thence along the middle of said river into Lake Ontario; through the middle of said lake until it strikes the communication by water between that lake and Lake Erie; thence along the middle of said communication into Lake Erie, through the middle of said lake until it arrives at the water communication between that lake and Lake Huron; thence along the middle of said water communication into Lake Huron, thence through the middle of said lake to the water communication

Primary Documents | 281

between that lake and Lake Superior; thence through Lake Superior northward of the Isles Royal and Phelipeaux to the Long Lake; thence through the middle of said Long Lake and the water communication between it and the Lake of the Woods, to the said Lake of the Woods; thence through the said lake to the most northwesternmost point thereof, and from thence on a due west course to the river Mississippi; thence by a line to be drawn along the middle of the said river Mississippi until it shall intersect the northernmost part of the thirty-first degree of north latitude, South, by a line to be drawn due east from the determination of the line last mentioned in the latitude of thirty-one degrees of the equator, to the middle of the river Apalachicola or Catahouche; thence along the middle thereof to its junction with the Flint River, thence straight to the head of Saint Mary’s River; and thence down along the middle of Saint Mary’s River to the Atlantic Ocean; east, by a line to be drawn along the middle of the river Saint Croix, from its mouth in the Bay of Fundy to its source, and from its source directly north to the aforesaid highlands which divide the rivers that fall into the Atlantic Ocean from those which fall into the river Saint Lawrence; comprehending all islands within twenty leagues of any part of the shores of the United States, and lying between lines to be drawn due east from the points where the aforesaid boundaries between Nova Scotia on the one part and East Florida on the other shall, respectively, touch the Bay of Fundy and the Atlantic Ocean, excepting such islands as now are or heretofore have been within the limits of the said province of Nova Scotia. Article 3: It is agreed that the people of the United States shall continue to enjoy unmolested

282 | Primary Documents

the right to take fish of every kind on the Grand Bank and on all the other banks of Newfoundland, also in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and at all other places in the sea, where the inhabitants of both countries used at any time heretofore to fish. And also that the inhabitants of the United States shall have liberty to take fish of every kind on such part of the coast of Newfoundland as British fishermen shall use, (but not to dry or cure the same on that island) and also on the coasts, bays and creeks of all other of his Brittanic Majesty’s dominions in America; and that the American fishermen shall have liberty to dry and cure fish in any of the unsettled bays, harbors, and creeks of Nova Scotia, Magdalen Islands, and Labrador, so long as the same shall remain unsettled, but so soon as the same or either of them shall be settled, it shall not be lawful for the said fishermen to dry or cure fish at such settlement without a previous agreement for that purpose with the inhabitants, proprietors, or possessors of the ground. Article 4: It is agreed that creditors on either side shall meet with no lawful impediment to the recovery of the full value in sterling money of all bona fide debts heretofore contracted. Article 5: It is agreed that Congress shall earnestly recommend it to the legislatures of the respective states to provide for the restitution of all estates, rights, and properties, which have been confiscated belonging to real British subjects; and also of the estates, rights, and properties of persons resident in districts in the possession on his Majesty’s arms and who have not borne arms against the said United States. And that persons of any other description shall have free liberty to go to any part or parts of any of the thirteen United

States and therein to remain twelve months unmolested in their endeavors to obtain the restitution of such of their estates, rights, and properties as may have been confiscated; and that Congress shall also earnestly recommend to the several states a reconsideration and revision of all acts or laws regarding the premises, so as to render the said laws or acts perfectly consistent not only with justice and equity but with that spirit of conciliation which on the return of the blessings of peace should universally prevail. And that Congress shall also earnestly recommend to the several states that the estates, rights, and properties, of such last mentioned persons shall be restored to them, they refunding to any persons who may be now in possession the bona fide price (where any has been given) which such persons may have paid on purchasing any of the said lands, rights, or properties since the confiscation. And it is agreed that all persons who have any interest in confiscated lands, either by debts, marriage settlements, or otherwise, shall meet with no lawful impediment in the prosecution of their just rights. Article 6: That there shall be no future confiscations made nor any prosecutions commenced against any person or persons for, or by reason of, the part which he or they may have taken in the present war, and that no person shall on that account suffer any future loss or damage, either in his person, liberty, or property; and that those who may be in confinement on such charges at the time of the ratification of the treaty in America shall be immediately set at liberty, and the prosecutions so commenced be discontinued. Article 7: There shall be a firm and perpetual peace between his Brittanic Majesty and the said



states, and between the subjects of the one and the citizens of the other, wherefore all hostilities both by sea and land shall from henceforth cease. All prisoners on both sides shall be set at liberty, and his Brittanic Majesty shall with all convenient speed, and without causing any destruction, or carrying away any Negroes or other property of the American inhabitants, withdraw all his armies, garrisons, and fleets from the said United States, and from every post, place, and harbor within the same; leaving in all fortifications, the American artillery that may be therein; and shall also order and cause all archives, records, deeds, and papers belonging to any of the said states, or their citizens, which in the course of the war may have fallen into the hands of his officers, to be forthwith restored and delivered to the proper states and persons to whom they belong. Article 8: The navigation of the river Mississippi, from its source to the ocean, shall forever remain free and open to the subjects of Great Britain and the citizens of the United States. Article 9: In case it should so happen that any place or territory belonging to Great Britain or to the United States should have been

Primary Documents | 283

conquered by the arms of either from the other before the arrival of the said Provisional Articles in America, it is agreed that the same shall be restored without difficulty and without requiring any compensation. Article 10: The solemn ratifications of the present treaty expedited in good and due form shall be exchanged between the contracting parties in the space of six months or sooner, if possible, to be computed from the day of the signatures of the present treaty. In witness whereof we the undersigned, their ministers plenipotentiary, have in their name and in virtue of our full powers, signed with our hands the present definitive treaty and caused the seals of our arms to be affixed thereto. Done at Paris, this third day of September in the year of our Lord, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-three. D. HARTLEY (SEAL) JOHN ADAMS (SEAL) B. FRANKLIN (SEAL) JOHN JAY (SEAL) Source: National Archives. https://founders. archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-40-02-0356.

Chronology

1754–1756 The French and Indian War takes place.

March 18, 1766 Parliament repeals the Stamp Act but passes the Declaratory Act.

November 20, 1760 George III becomes king of England.

June 29, 1767 Parliament passes the Townshend Acts, imposing a new series of colonial taxes.

February 10, 1763 The Treaty of Paris ends the French and Indian War, with France essentially expelled from the Americas.

October 28, 1767 The colonial nonimportation movement boycotting British goods begins.

1763–1765 Ottawa chief Pontiac leads a revolt by Native Americans against the British.

February 11, 1768 The Massachusetts Circular Letter sent to other colonial assemblies opposes taxation without representation and calls on united colonial opposition.

October 7, 1763 King George III signs the Proclamation Act of 1763 to contain the westward expansion of the American colonies, causing colonial resentment.

March 5, 1770 Increasing tensions between Bostonians and British soldiers erupt into violence in which five colonists are killed. This event becomes known as the Boston Massacre.

April 5, 1764 Parliament passes the Sugar Act to raise revenue for colonial defense and administration.

April 12, 1770 The Townshend Acts are repealed, except for that regarding tea.

March 22, 1765 Parliament passes the Stamp Act, a direct tax on the colonies. It meets hostile reaction.

May 16, 1771 In the Battle of Alamance Creek in North Carolina, militiamen under royal governor

285

286 | Chronology

William Tryon defeat the Regulators, farmers from the western counties protesting government corruption.

May 9–10, 1775 Patriot forces seize Forts Ticonderoga and Crown Point, securing much-needed matériel and guns.

June 9–10, 1772 The British customs vessel Gaspee runs aground in Rhode Island and is attacked and destroyed by colonists.

May 10, 1775 The Second Continental Congress meets in Philadelphia.

May 10, 1773 Parliament passes the Tea Act, giving the ailing British East India Company a tea monopoly by underselling American merchants.

June 14, 1775 The Continental Congress agrees to raise an army and the next day names George Washington commander of the new Continental Army.

December 16, 1773 The Boston Tea Party occurs, during which colonists dump 90,000 pounds of British tea into Boston Harbor in opposition to the Tea Act. March–June 1774 In response to the Boston Tea Party, Parliament passes the Coercive Acts, known to the colonists as the “Intolerable Acts.” September 5, 1774 The First Continental Congress begins. Representatives from 12 of the 13 colonies meet to develop a response to the Coercive Acts. April 19, 1775 The Battles of Lexington and Concord occur, during which British troops and militiamen clash directly for the first time, marking the beginning of the Revolutionary War. April 19, 1775–March 17, 1776 Colonial forces carry out a siege of Boston.

June 17, 1775 The Battle of Bunker Hill is fought, the first pitched battle of the war. Although the British win, their casualties are nearly three times those of the Patriot side. July 6, 1775 The Continental Congress issues its Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms. July 8, 1775 The Continental Congress issues its Olive Branch Petition. August 23, 1775 King George III declares the American colonies to be in rebellion. September 5, 1775 Patriot forces under Major General Philip Schuyler begin an invasion of Canada. October 10, 1775 General William Howe succeeds Thomas Gage as commander in chief of British forces in North America.

Chronology | 287

November 11, 1775 Patriot forces under Brigadier General Richard Montgomery take Montreal. November 28, 1775 The Continental Congress authorizes formation of a Continental Navy. December 31, 1775 Patriot forces under Montgomery and Colonel Benedict Arnold attack Quebec but are repelled; Montgomery is killed. March 17, 1776 British forces evacuate Boston. June 6, 1776 British forces defeat the Patriots in the Battle of Trois Rivières in Canada. June 7, 1776 Richard Henry Lee offers a resolution for independence to the Second Continental Congress. June 17, 1776 British forces reoccupy Montreal. June 28, 1776 Royal Navy ships under Commodore Peter Parker shell Sullivan’s Island, South Carolina, in the hopes of seizing Charles Town (Charleston) but are repelled. July 4, 1776 The Second Continental Congress approves the Declaration of Independence. August 27, 1776 British forces invade Long Island, New York, and defeat the Americans, most of whom are able to get away.

August 28, 1776 British forces win the Battle of Brooklyn. September 16, 1776 British forces win the Battle of Harlem Heights. October 11–13, 1776 British forces win the Battle of Valcour Island (Lake Champlain), but the American flotilla has caused the British to delay their invasion from Canada via Lake Champlain. October 28, 1776 British forces win the Battle of White Plains. November 16, 1776 In one of the most costly defeats for the Patriot side in the war, British forces capture Fort Washington. November 20, 1776 British forces capture Fort Lee, New Jersey. December 26, 1776 Patriot forces under General George Washington, having retreated across New Jersey, turn and defeat a Hessian garrison force in the Battle of Trenton, breathing new life into the Patriot cause. January 3, 1777 Patriot forces under Washington defeat British forces in the Battle of Princeton in New Jersey. June 17, 1777 British forces under Lieutenant General John Burgoyne begin their invasion of New York from Canada down the Lake Champlain route.

288 | Chronology

July 6, 1777 Burgoyne’s forces capture Fort Ticonderoga, but most of its Patriot defenders under Major General Arthur St. Clair escape.

October 3, 1777 British forces under Lieutenant General Henry Clinton proceed up the Hudson River from New York City.

July 23, 1777 Howe sails with a British army from New York bound for the Chesapeake Bay.

October 4, 1777 British forces under Howe turn back a Patriot attack under Washington in the Battle of Germantown, near Philadelphia.

August 2, 1777 British forces arrive at Fort Stanwix, a Patriot fort in New York, and commence a siege. August 6, 1777 In the Battle of Oriskany, Patriot forces hoping to relieve Fort Stanwix are defeated by Iroquois Native Americans and Loyalists.

October 6, 1777 British forces under Clinton capture Forts Clinton and Montgomery, Patriot forts on the Hudson River. October 7, 1777 In the Second Battle of Saratoga (Bemis Heights), Patriot forces under Gates again defeat Burgoyne’s forces.

August 16, 1777 In the Battle of Bennington in New York, the Patriots rout Hessian forces.

October 17, 1777 Burgoyne surrenders his army to Gates.

August 23, 1777 British forces raise the siege of Fort Stanwix and withdraw northward.

October 22, 1777 The Patriots turn back a Hessian assault on Fort Mercer, on the Delaware River.

September 11, 1777 British forces under Howe, having landed at the head of Chesapeake Bay, defeat the Patriots under Washington in the Battle of Brandywine, clearing the way for Howe’s goal of capturing Philadelphia.

November 15, 1777 The Second Continental Congress adopts the Articles of Confederation. Patriot forces evacuate Fort Mifflin, on the Delaware River.

September 19, 1777 Patriot forces under Major General Horatio Gates turn back the British under Burgoyne in the First Battle of Saratoga (Freeman’s Farm). September 26, 1777 British troops under Howe occupy the colonial capital of Philadelphia.

December 19, 1777 Washington establishes his winter headquarters at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. February 6, 1778 Patriot diplomats, including Benjamin Franklin, sign a treaty of alliance with France. March 16, 1778 Parliament authorizes Frederick Howard, the Earl of Carlisle, to head a peace

Chronology | 289

commission and meet with U.S. representatives. He has broad authority to negotiate except for the granting of independence. June 17, 1778 Fighting commences at sea between France and Great Britain. June 28, 1778 In the Battle of Monmouth, Continental Army units attack the British withdrawing from Philadelphia but are turned back. July 20, 1778 Patriot forces under Virginia Militia lieutenant colonel George Rogers Clark, having taken the distant British post of Kaskaskia in Illinois, capture the fort at Vincennes, Indiana. July 29–August 31, 1778 In the Rhode Island campaign, American and French forces attempt to capture Newport. In the culminating Battle of Newport, the Patriots turn back a British counterattack but then withdraw. August 2, 1778 France formally declares war on Great Britain. September 2, 1778 French forces capture the British Island of St. Lucia. December 17, 1778 British forces recapture Fort Vincennes. December 28, 1778 British forces retake St. Lucia. December 29, 1778 British forces capture Savannah, Georgia.

January 29, 1779 British forces capture Augusta, Georgia. February 25, 1779 Patriot forces under Clark retake Fort Vincennes. April 20, 1779 The Sullivan-Clinton expedition (known for its principal commanders, Major General John Sullivan and Brigadier General James Clinton), instituted by Washington to break the power of the Iroquois Confederation, begins. June 1, 1779 The British capture Stony Point, New York. June 18, 1779 French forces capture the island of St. Vincent. June 21, 1779 Spain declares war on Great Britain. Spanish and French troops begin the Siege of Gibraltar. Unsuccessful, it ends on February 6, 1783. July 4, 1779 French forces capture the British island of Grenada. July 6, 1779 In the naval Battle of Grenada, French forces under Jean-Baptiste-Charles-HenriHector, comte d’Estaing, turn back a British effort by Vice Admiral Sir John Byron to recapture the island. July 15–16, 1779 Patriot forces under Brigadier General Anthony Wayne capture the British fort at Stony Point.

290 | Chronology

July 25–August 14, 1779 Massachusetts spearheads a Patriot effort to capture a British fort on the Bagaduce Peninsula in the bay of the Penobscot River, but poor leadership and the arrival of a powerful British naval squadron bring disaster for the Patriot side.

by Patriot forces under Major General Benjamin Lincoln.

August 17, 1779 Spanish governor Bernardo de Gález y Madrid of Louisiana departs New Orleans to attack British forts up the Mississippi River.

May 18, 1780 Attempting to pacify the remainder of South Carolina, British lieutenant general Lord Charles Cornwallis marches into the interior.

August 19, 1779 Patriot forces capture the British outpost at Paulus Hook, New Jersey.

May 29, 1780 British lieutenant colonel Banastre Tarleton’s force mauls Patriot forces in the Battle of the Waxhaws in South Carolina.

September 16–October 18, 1779 French and American forces unsuccessfully besiege Savannah, Georgia, in what is the bloodiest battle of the war for the allied side. September 23, 1779 In the North Sea, John Paul Jones, in the Continental Navy frigate Bonhomme Richard, defeats the British frigate Serapis commanded by Captain Richard Person. December 1, 1779 Washington leads the Continental Army into winter quarters at Morristown, New Jersey. The suffering here is worse than at Valley Forge.

May 12, 1780 Lincoln surrenders Charles Town in what is the greatest defeat for the Patriot side in the war in terms of the number of men lost.

August 16, 1780 Cornwallis soundly defeats Patriot forces under Gates in the Battle of Camden in South Carolina. September 25, 1780 British major John André is captured with papers revealing the treason of Continental Army general Benedict Arnold. October 7, 1780 In an important battle, Patriot militia defeat Loyalist militia in the Battle of Kings Mountain in South Carolina.

March 14, 1780 De Gálvez captures the British fort at Mobile following an 11-day siege.

December 2, 1780 Major General Nathanael Greene arrives at Charlotte, North Carolina, to take command of Patriot forces in the South.

March 29, 1780 British forces under Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton besiege Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, which is held

December 20, 1780 To end Dutch trade with France and the American rebels, Britain declares war on the Netherlands.

Chronology | 291

December 30, 1780 British forces, commanded by Benedict Arnold, now a British brigadier general, land at Hampton Roads and commence a campaign in Virginia.

June 2, 1781 French forces capture the island of Tobago.

January 5–6, 1781 British forces raid Richmond, Virginia.

August 4, 1781 Cornwallis relocates his forces to the port of Yorktown, Virginia.

January 17, 1781 Patriot forces under Brigadier General Daniel Morgan soundly defeat Tarleton’s legion in the Battle of Cowpens in South Carolina. February 3, 1781 British forces under Admiral Sir George Brydges Rodney capture the Dutch island of St. Eustatius. March 15, 1781 British forces under Cornwallis defeat Patriot forces under Greene in the Battle of Guilford Courthouse, but the British sustain heavy casualties. Cornwallis then relocates to Wilmington. April 23, 1781 Cornwallis departs North Carolina for Virginia. April 25, 1781 British forces under Lieutenant Colonel Lord Francis Rawdon defeat Patriot forces under Greene in the Battle of Hobkirk’s Hill in South Carolina. May 10, 1781 Following a siege, Spanish forces under de Gálvez capture British-held Pensacola. May 11–June 5, 1781 Patriot forces capture British outposts in South Carolina.

June 3–4, 1781 British forces raid Charlottesville, Virginia.

August 21, 1781 Washington sets out with Continental Army and French forces under Lieutenant General Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau, in forced marches south toward Yorktown. September 5, 1781 A French fleet under Admiral de GrasseTilly turns back a British fleet in the tactically inconclusive yet strategically critical Second Battle of the Chesapeake. Cornwallis’s British army is now cut off at Yorktown. September 6, 1781 British forces under Arnold raid New London, Connecticut. September 8, 1781 British forces under Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Steward fight Patriot forces under Greene to a draw in the Battle of Eutaw Springs, near Charleston, South Carolina, in the last major engagement in the South of the war. October 19, 1781 Cornwallis surrenders his army at Yorktown to Patriot and French forces. November 26, 1781 French forces capture St. Eustatius.

292 | Chronology

February 12, 1782 French forces capture St. Kitts. March 5, 1782 The British House of Lords empowers King George III to make peace with the “former colonies.” March 20, 1782 Lord Frederick North, 2nd Earl of Guilford, and a strong supporter of the war, resigns as British prime minister. April 12, 1782 British forces under Admiral Rodney win a major naval fleet engagement over the French under Admiral de Grasse-Tilly in the Battle of the Saintes. September 27, 1782 Representatives of Britain and the United States open formal peace negotiations in Paris.

January 20, 1783 Representatives of Britain, France, and Spain agree to peace terms. February 4, 1783 King George III declares a formal end to hostilities in America. April 15, 1783 The Confederation Congress ratifies a preliminary draft of the Treaty of Paris, ending the American Revolutionary War. January 14, 1784 The Confederation Congress ratifies the Treaty of Paris. September 17, 1787 The U.S. Constitution is signed and submitted to the Continental Congress.

November 30, 1782 The Treaty of Paris, between the representatives of the United States and the British government, is concluded.

June 2, 1788 The Constitution goes into effect.

December 14, 1782 British forces evacuate Charles Town (Charleston).

April 30, 1789 George Washington takes the oath of office as the first president of the United States.

Bibliography

Alden, John R. George Washington: A Biography. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1984. Alden, John R. A History of the American Revolution. New York: Knopf, 1969. Ammerman, David. In the Common Cause: American Response to the Coercive Acts of 1774. New York: Norton, 1975. Andrews, Joseph L., Jr. Revolutionary Boston, Lexington & Concord: The Shots Heard ’Round the World! Concord, MA: Concord Guides, 1999. Babits, Lawrence. A Devil of a Whipping: The Battle of Cowpens. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1998. Bailyn, Bernard. The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution. 1967. Reprint, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992. Balderston, Marion, and David Syrett. The Lost War: Letters from British Officers during the American Revolution. New York: Horizon Press, 1979. Barck, Oscar. New York City during the War for Independence. New York: Columbia University Press, 1931. Becker, Carl L. The Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Political Ideas. New York: Knopf, 1942. Billias, George A., ed. George Washington’s Generals and Opponents: Their Exploits and Leadership. 1964. Reprint, New York: Da Capo, 1994.

Bird, Harrison. March to Saratoga: General Burgoyne and the American Campaign, 1777. New York: Oxford University Press, 1963. Black, Jeremy. War for America: The Fight for Independence, 1775–1783. Phoenix Mill, Far Thrupp, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK: Alan Sutton, 1991. Bliven, Bruce. American Revolution, 1760– 1783. New York: Random House, 1981. Bowen-Hassell, E. Gordon, Dennis M. Conrad, and Mark L. Hayes, eds. Sea Raiders of the American Revolution: The Continental Navy in European Waters. Washington, DC: Naval Historical Center, Department of the Navy, 2003. Brant, Irving. James Madison. Vols. 1–3. Indianapolis, IN: Bobbs-Merrill, 1941. Brown, Gerald Saxon. The American Secretary: The Colonial Policy of Lord George Germain, 1775–1778. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1963. Brown, Wallace. The Good Americans: The Loyalists in the American Revolution. New York: Morrow, 1969. Buchanan, John. The Road to Valley Forge: How Washington Built the Army That Won the Revolution. New York: Wiley, 2004. Carrington, Henry B. Battles of the American Revolution, 1775–1781. 1876. Reprint, New York: Promontory, 1974. Coakley, Robert W. The War of the American Revolution: Narrative, Chronology, and 293

294 | Bibliography Bibliography. Washington, DC: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 2004. Cornwallis, Charles. Correspondence of Charles, 1st Marquis Cornwallis. Edited with notes by Charles Ross. London: John Murray, 1859. Corwin, Edward. French Policy and the American Alliance of 1778. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1916. Curtis, Edward P. The Organization of the British Army in the American Revolution. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1926. Davis, Burke. Black Heroes of the American Revolution. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1976. Donoughue, Bernard. British Politics and the American Revolution: The Path to War, 1773–75. London: Macmillan, 1964. Dull, Jonathan R. A Diplomatic History of the American Revolution. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1985. Dull, Jonathan R. The French Navy and the American Revolution: A Study of Arms and Diplomacy, 1774–1787. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1975. Dwyer, William M. The Day Is Ours! An Inside View of the Battles of Trenton and Princeton, November 1776–January 1777. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1998. Eelking, Max von. The German Allied Troops in the North American War of Independence, 1776–1783. Translated and abridged by J. G. Rosengarten. Albany, NY: J. Munsell’s Sons, 1893. Evans, Elizabeth. Weathering the Storm: Women of the American Revolution. New York: Paragon, 1989. Ewald, Johann. Diary of the American War: A Hessian Journal. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1979. Fleming, Thomas. 1776: Year of Illusions. New York: Norton, 1975. Frey, Sylvia R. The British Soldier in America: A Social History of Military Life in the

Revolutionary Period. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1981. Gage, Thomas. The Correspondence of General Thomas Gage with the Secretaries of State, 1763–1770. Edited by Clarence E. Carter. 2 vols. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1931–1933. Grant, John N., and Phyllis R. Blakeley. Eleven Exiles: Accounts of Loyalists of the American Revolution. Toronto: Dundurn, 1982. Graymont, Barbara. The Iroquois in the American Revolution. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1982. Greene, Francis V. The Revolutionary War and Military Policy of the United States. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1911. Gruber, Ira D. The Howe Brothers and the American Revolution. New York: Norton, 1972. Hatch, Robert M. Thrust for Canada: The American Attempt on Quebec in 1775– 1776. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1979. Hawke, David. The Colonial Experience. Indianapolis, IN: Bobbs-Merrill, 1966. Henderson, H. James. Party Politics in the Continental Congress. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1974. Higginbotham, Don. George Washington and the American Military Tradition. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1985. Higginbotham, Don. The War of American Independence: Military Attitudes, Policies, and Practice, 1763–1789. New York: Macmillan, 1971. Hoffman, Ronald, and Peter J. Albert, eds. Diplomacy and Revolution: The FrancoAmerican Alliance of 1778. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1981. Hoffman, Ronald, and Peter J. Albert, eds. Women in the Age of the American Revolution. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1989. Hoffman, Ronald, Thad Tate, and Peter Albert, eds. An Uncivil War: The Southern

Bibliography | 295 Backcountry. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1985. Holton, Woody. Forced Founders: Indians, Debtors, Slaves, and the Making of the American Revolution in Virginia. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1999. Huston, James. Logistics of Liberty: American Services of Supply in the Revolutionary War and After. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1991. Jackson, Donald, et al., eds. The Diaries of George Washington. 6 vols. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1976–1979. Jackson, John W. With the British Army in Philadelphia, 1777–1778. San Rafael, CA: Presidio, 1979. Kerr, Wilfred B. Bermuda and the American Revolution: 1760–1783. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1936. Ketchum, Richard. Decisive Day: The Battle for Bunker Hill. 1974. Reprint, New York: Henry Holt, 1999. Ketchum, Richard. Victory at Yorktown: The Campaign That Won the Revolution. New York: Henry Holt, 2004. Kwasny, Mark V. Washington’s Partisan War, 1775–1783. Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1996. Lamb, Roger. An Original and Authentic Journal of Occurrences during the Late American War from Its Commencement to the Year 1783. Dublin: Wilkinson and Courtney, 1809. Larrabee, Harold. Decision at the Chesapeake. New York: Clarkson Potter, 1984. Leckie, Robert. George Washington’s War: The Saga of the American Revolution. New York: HarperCollins, 1992. Lowell, Edward J. The Hessians and the Other German Auxiliaries of Great Britain in the Revolutionary War. 1884. Reprint, Williamstown, MA: Corner House, 1975. Lowell, Harrison H. George Rogers Clark and the War in the West. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1976.

Lumpkin, Henry. From Savannah to Yorktown: The American Revolution in the South. New York: Paragon, 1981. Mackesy, Piers. The War for America, 1775– 1783. 1965. Reprint, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1993. Maier, Pauline. From Resistance to Revolution: Colonial Radicals and the Development of American Opposition to Britain, 1765–1776. New York: Knopf, 1972. Mann, Barbara Alice. George Washington’s War on Native America. Westport, CT: Praeger, 2005. Martin, James Kirby, and Mark E. Lender. A Respectable Army: The Military Origins of the Republic, 1763–1789. Wheeling, IL: Harlan Davidson, 1982. McCusker, John, and Russell Menard. The Economy of British America, 1607–1789. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1985. Middlekauff, Robert. The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763–1789. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Miller, John C. Triumph of Freedom, 1775– 1783. Boston: Little, Brown, 1848. Mintz, Max M. The Generals of Saratoga: John Burgoyne and Horatio Gates. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1990. Montross, Lynn. The Reluctant Rebels: The Story of the Continental Congress, 1774– 1789. New York: Harper, 1950. Morrill, Dan L. Southern Campaigns of the American Revolution. Baltimore, MD: Nautical and Aviation Publishing Company of America, 1993. Nelson, Paul David. General Horatio Gates: A Biography. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1776. Nester, William R. Frontier War for American Independence. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole, 2004. Neumann, George. Battle Weapons of the American Revolution. Texarkana, TX: Scurlock, 1998.

296 | Bibliography Norton, Mary Beth. Liberty’s Daughters: The Revolutionary Experience of American Women, 1750–1800. Boston: Little, Brown, 1980. O’Donnell, James H. Southern Indians in the American Revolution. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1973. O’Kelly, Patrick. Nothing but Blood and Slaughter: The Revolutionary War in the Carolinas. Vol. 1, 1771–1779. Bangor, ME: Booklocker.com, 2004. O’Shaughnessy, Andrew Jackson. An Empire Divided: The American Revolution and the British Caribbean. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000. Pancake, John S. 1777: The Year of the Hangman. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1977. Pancake, John S. This Destructive War: The British Campaign for the Carolinas, 1780– 1782. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1985. Patterson, Benton Rain. Washington and Cornwallis: The Battle for America, 1775– 1783. New York: Taylor Trade Publishing, 2004. Pearson, Michael. Those Damned Rebels: The American Revolution as Seen through British Eyes. New York: Putnam, 1972. Peterson, Harold L. The Book of the Continental Soldier: Being a Complete Account of the Uniforms, Weapons, and Equipment with Which He Lived and Fought. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole, 1968. Reed, John F. Campaign to Valley Forge: July 1 to December 19, 1777. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1965. Reis, Oscar. Medicine and the American Revolution: How Diseases and Their Treatments Affected the Colonial Army. 1998. Reprint, New York: McFarland, 2005. Rice, Howard C., and Anne S. K. Brown, eds. The American Campaigns of Rochambeau in America. 2 vols. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1972.

Richter, Daniel K. Facing East from Indian Country: A Native History of Early America. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001. Risch, Erna. Supplying Washington’s Army. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1981. Rossie, Jonathan Gregory. The Politics of Command in the American Revolution. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1975. Scheer, George F., ed. Private Yankee Doodle: Being a Narrative of Some of the Adventures, Dangers and Sufferings of a Revolutionary Soldier, by Joseph Plumb Martin. Boston: Little, Brown, 1962. Schulte Nordholt, Jan Willem. The Dutch Republic and American Independence. Translated by Herbert H. Rowen. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1982. Scott, H. M. British Foreign Policy in the Age of the American Revolution. New York: Oxford University Press, 1990. Shoenbrun, David. Triumph in Paris: The Exploits of Benjamin Franklin. New York: Harper and Row, 1976. Shy, John. Toward Lexington: The Role of the British Army in the Coming of the American Revolution. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1965. Silverman, Kenneth. A Cultural History of the American Revolution: Painting, Music, Literature, and the Theatre in the Colonies and the United States from the Treaty of Paris to the Inauguration of George Washington, 1763–1789. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1976. Singh, R. John. French Diplomacy in the Caribbean and the American Revolution. Hicksville, NY: Exposition Press, 1977. Smith, David G. The Convention and the Constitution: The Political Ideas of the Founding Fathers. New York: St. Martin’s, 1965.

Bibliography | 297 Smith, Justin H. Our Struggle for the Fourteenth Colony: Canada and the American Revolution. 2 vols. 1907. Reprint, New York: Da Capo, 1974. Sosin, Jack M. The Revolutionary Frontier, 1763–1783. New York: Harper and Row, 1967.

Tilley, J. A. The Royal Navy in the American Revolution. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1987. Tornquist, Karl Gustaf. The Naval Campaigns of Count de Grasse during the American Revolution, 1781–1783. Philadelphia: Swedish Colonial Society, 1942.

Spector, Margaret. The American Department of the British Government, 1768–1782. New York: Octagon, 1976.

Tucker, Spencer C., ed. American Revolution: The Definitive Encyclopedia and Document Collection. 5 vols. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2018.

Stanley, George. Canada Invaded, 1775–1776. Toronto: Canadian War Museum, 1973. Stryker, William S. The Battle of Monmouth. 1927. Reprint, Port Washington, NY: Kennikat, 1970. Swiggett, H. War Out of Niagara: Walter Butler and the Tory Rangers. 1933. Reprint, Port Washington, NY: I. J. Friedman, 1963. Sword, Wiley. President Washington’s Indian War: The Struggle for the Old Northwest, 1790–1795. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1985. Symonds, Craig L. A Battlefield Atlas of the American Revolution. Mount Pleasant, SC: Nautical and Aviation Publishing Company of America, 1986. Taaffe, Stephen R. The Philadelphia Campaign, 1777–1778. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2003. Tarleton, Banastre. History of the Campaigns of 1780 and 1781, in the Southern Provinces of North America. 1787. Reprint, New York: New York Times, 1968. Thayer, Theodore G. Yorktown: Campaign of Strategic Options. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1975. Thomas, P. D. G. British Politics and the Stamp Act Crisis: The First Phase of the American Revolution. Oxford, UK: Clarendon, 1975. Thomas, P. D. G. The Townshend Duties Crisis: The Second Phase of the American Revolution, 1767–1773. Oxford, UK: Clarendon, 1987.

Tucker, Spencer C. Rise and Fight Again: The Life of General Nathanael Greene. Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2009. Tuckerman, Bayard. Life of General Philip Schuyler, 1733–1804. New York: Dodd, Mead, 1903. Ueberhorst, Horst. Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben: Soldier and Democrat. Baltimore, MD: Moos, 1981. Van Alstyne, Richard. Empire and Independence: The International History of American Revolution. New York: Quadrangle, 1965. Van Doren, Carl. Secret History of the American Revolution: An Account of the Conspiracies of Benedict Arnold and Numerous Others from the Secret Service Papers of the British Headquarters in North America. New York: Viking, 1941. Venables, Robert W. The Hudson Valley in the American Revolution. Albany: New York State American Revolution Bicentennial Commission, 1975. Ward, Christopher. War of the Revolution. 2 vols. New York: Macmillan, 1952. Weintraub, Stanley. Iron Tears: America’s Battle for Freedom, Britain’s Quagmire, 1775–1783. New York: Free Press, 2005. Wheeler, Richard. Voices of 1776. New York: Meridian Books, 1972. White, Katherine Keogh. The King’s Mountain Men. Baltimore, MD: Genealogical Publishing Company, 1985.

298 | Bibliography Wickwire, Franklin, and Mary Wickwire. Cornwallis: The American Adventure. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1970. Wildes, Harry Emerson. Anthony Wayne: Trouble Shooter of the American Revolution. New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1941. Willcox, William B. Portrait of a General: Sir Henry Clinton in the War of Independence. New York: Knopf, 1964.

Wood, Gordon S. The Creation of the American Republic, 1776–1787. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1969. Wood, W. J. Battles of the Revolutionary War, 1775–1781. Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin, 1990. Wright, Robert K. The Continental Army. Washington, DC: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1989.

About the Editor and Contributors

Editor

History awards for best reference work in military history (2008, 2010, and 2014), and four American Library Association RUSA Outstanding Reference Source awards (2009, 2010, 2014, 2015).

Dr. Spencer C. Tucker graduated from the Virginia Military Institute and was a Fulbright scholar in France. He earned both the MA and PhD degrees from the University of North Carolina and served as a U.S. Army captain and intelligence analyst in the Pentagon during the Vietnam War. He then taught for 30 years at Texas Christian University and was chairman of the History Department before returning to his alma mater for 6 years as the holder of the John Biggs Chair of Military History. He retired from teaching in 2003. He is now Senior Fellow of Military History at ABC-CLIO. Dr. Tucker has written or edited 70 books, including ABC-CLIO’s award-winning The Encyclopedia of the Cold War and The Encyclopedia of the Arab-Israeli Conflict as well as the comprehensive A Global Chronology of Conflict.

Contributors Dr. Stefan M. Brooks is an assistant professor of political science at Lindsey Wilson College. He has contributed to The Encyclopedia of the Arab-Israeli Conflict: A Political, Social, and Military History (ABC-CLIO, 2008) and The Encyclopedia of Middle East Wars: The United States in the Persian Gulf, Afghanistan, and Iraq Conflicts (ABC-CLIO, 2010). Lori Brown is an assistant professor in the Department of Aviation Sciences at Western Michigan University. She earned a master of aviation human factors degree at Swinburne University of Technology.

Among honors he has received for his publications are two John Lyman Book Awards from the North American Society for Oceanic History (1989 and 2000), the Rear Admiral Ernest M. Eller Naval History Prize for best article in naval history (2000), the Theodore Roosevelt and Franklin D. Roosevelt Prize for best book in naval history (2004), three Society for Military

Jeffrey W. Dennis is a professor of history at Southwestern Michigan College. He has contributed to U.S. Leadership in Wartime: Clashes, Controversy, and Compromise (ABC-CLIO, 2009) and American Revolution: The Definitive Encyclopedia and Document Collection (ABC-CLIO, 2018).

299

300 | About the Editor and Contributors

Dr. John C. Fredriksen (1953–2014), a noted military historian, authored 30 reference books on various subjects. He earned degrees from UCLA, the University of Michigan, the University of Rhode Island, and Providence College, where he received his doctorate in military history. His many books include The United States Air Force: A Chronology (ABC-CLIO, 2011) and American Military Leaders: From Colonial Times to the Present (ABC-CLIO, 1999). Joseph A. Goldenberg is a maritime historian. He earned a doctorate in American history at the University of North Carolina and taught at Virginia State College. He is the author of Shipbuilding in Colonial America (Mariners Museum, 1976) and a contributor to The Encyclopedia of the War of 1812: A Political, Social, and Military History (ABC-CLIO, 2012). Barbara Alice Mann, PhD, is an assistant professor in the Honors College at the University of Toledo in Toledo, Ohio. She has authored nine books, including The Tainted Gift (Praeger, 2009); Iroquoian Women: The Gantowisas (P. Lang, 2000); George Washington’s War on Native America (Praeger, 2005); and Daughters of Mother Earth (Praeger, 2006). An Ohio Bear Clan Seneca, Mann lives in her homeland and works for the rights of the people indigenous to Ohio. Martin J. Manning has served as a librarian and archivist in the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State, maintaining its public diplomacy archives. He has degrees from Boston College and Catholic University. He has written and lectured on U.S. propaganda (public diplomacy) and popular culture. Manning is a contributor to reference books and encyclopedias, and he is the

author of the Historical Dictionary of American Propaganda (Greenwood, 2004). He is also the coeditor of Encyclopedia of Media and Propaganda in Wartime America (ABC-CLIO, 2010) and Pop Culture versus Real America (Bureau of International Information Programs, 2010). Kevin D. McCranie, PhD, is an associate professor of strategy and policy at the U.S. Naval War College in Rhode Island. His research focuses on the naval history and strategy of the American Revolution and Napoleonic Wars, and he is the author of Admiral Lord Keith and the Naval War against Napoleon (University Press of Florida, 2006). McCranie holds a PhD in history from Florida State University. Dr. Paul David Nelson is Julian-Van Dusen Professor Emeritus of American History at Berea College. He is a member of the Ramsey County Historical Society. Nelson is the author of several books and other publications, including Francis Rawdon-Hastings, Marquess of Hastings: Soldier, Peer of the Realm, Governor-General of India (Rowman & Littlefield, 2005) and Fredrick L. McGhee: A Life on the Color Line, 1861– 1912 (Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2002). Steven G. O’Brien is an independent history scholar. He has contributed to such books as American Civil War: The Essential Reference Guide (ABC-CLIO, 2011) and The Encyclopedia of the War of 1812 (ABC-CLIO, 2012) and authored American Political Leaders: From Colonial Times to the Present (ABC-CLIO, 1991). James K. Perrin Jr. studied at the Virginia Military Institute and Ohio State University. He contributed to ABC-CLIO’s The Encyclopedia of North American Indian



Wars, 1607–1890: A Political, Social, and Military History (2011). Joe Petrulionis is an instructor of philosophy and history at Penn State University in Altoona, Pennsylvania. Dr. Jim Piecuch is a professor of history at Kennesaw State University. He earned his PhD in American history at the College of William and Mary and his MA from the University of New Hampshire. Piecuch has a particular interest in the American Revolution. He is the author of The Battle of Camden: A Documentary History (2006); “The Blood Be upon Your Head”: Tarleton and the Myth of Buford’s Massacre (2010); and Three Peoples, One King: Loyalists, Indians and Slaves in the Revolutionary South (2008). Dr. Paul G. Pierpaoli Jr. received his MA and PhD degrees from The Ohio State University. He has also served on the faculties of numerous schools, including HampdenSydney College, the University of Arizona, and the Virginia Military Institute. Richard J. Shuster, PhD, is a professor and Defense Intelligence Agency representative at the U.S. Naval War College in Rhode Island. He has published several short works on defense intelligence and counterinsurgency and has also provided contributions to The Encyclopedia of World War I: A Political, Social, and Military History (ABC-CLIO, 2005). Shuster holds a PhD in modern European history from George Washington University in Washington, DC. Paul J. Springer is a full professor of comparative military studies and the chair of the Department of Research and Publications at the Air Command and Staff College, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama. His

About the Editor and Contributors | 301

published works include America’s Captives: Treatment of POWs from the Revolutionary War to the War on Terror; Praeger’s Outsourcing War to Machines: The Military Robotics Revolution; ABC-CLIO’s Military Robots and Drones: A Reference Handbook and Cyber Warfare: A Reference Handbook; and Transforming Civil War Prisons: Lincoln, Lieber, and the Laws of War. Springer holds a doctorate in military history from Texas A&M University and is a senior fellow of the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia. John R. Vile, PhD, is a professor of political science and dean of the University Honors College at Middle Tennessee State University. He has written and edited more than 25 books. His recent publications include Essential Supreme Court Decisions: Summaries of Leading Cases in U.S. Constitutional Law (Rowman & Littlefield, 2014); Encyclopedia of Constitutional Amendments, Proposed Amendments, and Amending Issues, fourth edition (ABCCLIO, 2015); A Companion to the United States Constitution and Its Amendments, sixth edition (Praeger, 2015); Founding Documents of America: Documents Decoded (ABC-CLIO, 2015); and The United States Constitution: One Document, Many Choices (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015). Vile is a member of the American Mock Trial Association and was named to the American Mock Trial Association’s Hall of Fame. MTSU awarded Vile its Outstanding Career Achievement Award in 2011. E. Michael Young is a professor of history and government at Trinity Valley Community College in Palestine, Texas. Young has an MA in political science from Texas State University, San Marcos, and an MA in history from California State University,

302 | About the Editor and Contributors

Northridge. Among his publications are reference entries for the The Encyclopedia of the War of 1812: A Political, Social, and Military History (ABC-CLIO, 2012) and American Civil War: The Definitive Encyclopedia and Document Collection (ABC-CLIO, 2013).

Major General David T. Zabecki is retired from the U.S. Army. He earned his PhD in military history at Cranfield University. Zabecki has published over 400 articles and written seven books, including Steel Wind: Colonel Georg Bruchmuller and the Birth of Modern Artillery (Praeger, 1994).

Index

Note: Page numbers in bold indicate the location of main entries. Abolitionist movement, 93, 108, 209, 211–212 Adams, Charles Francis, 3 Adams, John, 1–4 administration of, 2–3 Alien and Sedition Acts, 3 American neutrality under, 2–3 appointment of Midnight Judges, 3 committee to draft Declaration of Independence, 1, 261, 264 Conway Cabal and, 80 death of, 3, 141 defeated for reelection (1800), 3 defense of British soldiers (Boston Massacre), 1, 28 diplomatic missions to Europe, 2, 222 early life and education, 1 elected first vice president (1788), 2 elected to Massachusetts General Court, 1 First Continental Congress, 1 Hamilton, Alexander, and, 2, 3 Jefferson, Thomas, and, 1–2, 3, 139, 140, 141 later life, 3 Naval Committee, 75 opposition to Stamp Act, 1 presidential election of 1796, 2, 140 Quasi-War, 3 Second Continental Congress, 1–2, 92, 139, 258

Thoughts on Government, 2 Treaty of Paris negotiations, 2, 221, 222, 279, 280, 283 two-party system under, 2 writing of Massachusetts Constitution, 2 XYZ Affair, 2–3 Adams, John Quincy, 3 Adams, Samuel, 4–6 Battles of Lexington and Concord, 154, 155 Boston Tea Party, 5, 29–30 Caucus Club member, 4 death of, 6 early career, 4 early years and education, 4 elected to Massachusetts colonial legislature, 5 First Continental Congress, 5 return to Massachusetts, 5–6 Second Continental Congress, 5 Stamp Act riots and, 4–5 support for Suffolk Resolves, 5, 29–30 Alien and Sedition Acts, 3, 140 Allen, Ethan, 23, 44 American Crisis, The (1776) (primary document), 266–268 background, 266 on being with troops at Fort Lee, 267 on panic and fear, 266–267 purpose of, 266 on retreat to the Delaware, 267 303

304 | Index

American Crisis (Continued) on the times that try men’s souls, 266 on the way forward and lack of fear, 267–268 Arnold, Benedict, 6–8 Battle of Bemis Heights (Second Battle of Saratoga), 7, 112 Battle of Freeman’s Farm (First Battle of Saratoga), 7 Battle of Quebec, 6, 47, 70, 180, 192–193, 287 Battle of Valcour Island, 47, 227–228 British brigadier general, 151–152, 245, 291 Canada expedition, 6, 44–45 capture of Fort Ticonderoga, 6, 23 death of, 7 early years, 6 failed promotion and resignation, 6–7 flotilla of, 6, 16–17 French and Indian War, 6 marriage to Peggy Shippen, 7 Saratoga campaign, 203, 205 Siege of Fort Stanwix, 7, 100–101 treason of, 7, 126, 147, 231, 290 wounding of, 6, 7, 45, 47, 180, 192–193 Articles of Confederation, 8–10 abolishment of, 10, 68, 94 approval of, 8, 288 Congressional powers and delegates, 8–9, 63 drafting of, 8, 63 land ordinances, 10 limitations of, 9–10, 63–65, 94, 183 Philadelphia Convention, 10, 64–65, 68 ratification of, 8, 63 Shays’ Rebellion and, 9–10 states’ rights system, 8 Artillery, land, 10–14 American artillery, 13–14 ammunition wagons and powder carts, 12 artillery ammunition, 12–14 black powder, 11

British artillery, 13 bronze and iron guns, 10–11 canister (case shot), 12–13 cannon, 10–12 cannon in forts, 12 crews, 11 explosive shells, 12 firing rates, 11 French artillery, 14 grapeshot, 12 hot shot, 12 howitzers, 10–11 maximum ranges, 10 mortars, 10–11 paper and parchment cartridges, 11 prepackaged powder charges, 11 priming wire, 11 shot, 12 spiking, 13 transportation of, 13 quoin, 11 Artillery, naval, 14–17 broadside guns, 14, 15, 16, 17 chase guns, 15 Coehorns, 15 gun ports, 15 hot shot, 16 howitzers, 15 long guns, 14, 15, 16 quoin, 14 repair of ship holes from round shot, 16 repositioning of guns aboard ships, 14 ship batteries, 16 sloops, 14–15 solid shot projectiles, 16 trunnions, 14 warships, 16 Bemis Heights, Battle of (Second Battle of Saratoga), 7, 37, 112, 158, 180, 205–206, 288 Bennington, Battle of, 19–20, 288 background, 19 battle, 20

Index | 305

Baum, Friedrich, 19, 20, 204 Breymann, Heinrich von, 19–20 Burgoyne, John, 19–20, 37, 158, 204 casualties and losses, 20, 204 Green Mountain Boys, 20 prelude, 19–20 Stark, John, 19–20, 204 Warner, Seth, 19, 20 Bill of Rights, 5, 68, 140. See also Constitution of the United States Bonhomme Richard versus Serapis, 21–23 background, 21 battle, 22 casualties and losses, 22, 143 Countess of Scarborough (Thomas Piercy), 21, 22 Jones, John Paul, 17, 21–22, 78, 143, 290 Pallas (Denis Cottineau), 21, 22 Pearson, Richard, 21, 22 prelude, 21–22 sinking of Bonhomme Richard, 22–23 surrender of Pearson, 22 Vengeance (Philippe Ricot), 21, 22 Boston, Siege of, 23–27, 286 aftermath, 27 authorization for Army of Observation, 23 Battle of Chelsea Creek, 24 British evacuation, 27 British reinforcements, 24 capture of Fort Ticonderoga, 6, 13, 23, 26 capture of Nancy, 25–26 casualties and losses, 25, 27 Clinton, Sir Henry, 24, 26 fortification of Dorchester Heights, 26–27 Gage, Thomas, 23–24, 25, 111 Greene, Nathanael, 25, 27, 125 Heath, William, 25 Howe, Sir William, 24–25, 26–27 Knox, Henry, 26, 146–147 Lincoln, Benjamin, 158 Patriot siege lines, 23 refusal to strike, 22 supply raid on Grape Island, 23–24

supply shortages, 23–24, 26 Ward, Artemis, 23, 24, 25, 27 Washington, George, 24, 25–26, 27, 146–147, 234 See also Bunker Hill, Battle of Boston Massacre, 27–28 aftermath, 28, 110 background, 27 casualties and losses, 28 events of, 27–28, 285 inciting incident, 27–28 Knox, Henry, witness to, 146 Preston, Thomas, 28, 252 trial of British soldiers, 1, 28, 146 Boston Massacre, newspaper account of (1770) (primary document), 251–253 background, 251–252 on command to fire, 253 on gathering crowd, 252–253 on inciting incident, 252 on soldiers in the streets, 252 Boston Tea Party, 28–30 Adams, Samuel, 5, 29 background, 28–29 Coercive Acts (Intolerable Acts) passed in response to, 5, 30, 61–63, 191, 286 events of, 30 Hutchinson, Thomas, 29–30 Townshend Acts and, 29 Brandywine, Battle of, 30–34 aftermath, 79, 120 background, 30–31 British advance, 32 British victory, 33–34, 288 casualties and losses, 34 Cornwallis, Charles, 32, 33, 83 Greene, Nathanael, 31, 32, 33 Howe, Sir William, 30–31, 32–33, 34, 135, 228–229, 288 Knox, Henry, 147 Knyphausen, Wilhelm, 32, 33, 149 Lafayette, 31, 72, 151 prelude, 31–32 Sullivan, John, 33

306 | Index

Brandywine, Battle of (Continued) Washington, George, 30–32, 33, 34, 72, 121, 135, 204, 229, 235, 288 Wayne, Anthony, 237–238 Brant, Joseph Battle of Newtown, 217 Cherry Valley Massacre, 51, 52–53 Siege of Fort Stanwix, 99, 100, 203 British Southern Strategy (1779) (primary document), 269–272 on allotments of land to loyal subjects, 272 background, 269–270 on contribution of Georgia to the empire, 272 on cooperation of inhabitants with King’s troops, 270 Germain, George, to Henry Clinton, 270 Germain, George, to James Wright, 270–272 on improvements to the former constitution, 272 on need for a declaratory act, 271–272 on need to recover South Carolina, 270 on restoring Georgians to enjoyment of civil government, 270–271 Bunker Hill, Battle of, 34–36 aftermath, 165, 186, 260 American soldiers in, 69 American withdrawal, 35 background, 34 battle, 34–35 British Pyrrhic victory, 25, 35–36, 59, 174–175, 286 capture of Breed’s Hill, 35 casualties and losses, 35 fortification of Breed’s Hill, 34 fortification of Winter Hill and Prospect Hill, 35 Howe, Sir William, 25, 35–36, 111, 134 Knox, Henry, 146 Prescott, William, 34 Putnam, Israel, 35 Siege of Boston and, 24–25

Burgoyne, John, 36–37 army commander in Canada, 47, 59 Battle of Bemis Heights, 37 Battle of Bennington, 19, 20, 37 capture of Fort Ticonderoga, 37, 112, 202, 288 Carleton, Sir Guy, and, 37, 47 Clinton, Sir Henry, and, 58, 59–60 death of, 37 early military career, 36 early years and education, 36 Gates, Horatio, and, 112 Germain, Lord George, and, 36, 117 Howe, Sir William, and, 134, 135–136 later life, 37, 206 Lincoln, Benjamin, and, 158 playwright, 36, 37 political career, 36 Saratoga campaign, 7, 37, 59–60, 99, 100, 101, 201–206, 287, 288 Schuyler, Philip, and, 207 Seven Years’ War, 36, 46 16th Light Dragoons (Burgoyne’s Horse), 36, 37 surrender of, 37, 60, 72, 112, 117, 132, 135, 186, 206, 230, 288 Butler, Walter, 52, 53 Camden campaign and battle, 39–43 Battle of Camden, 41–43, 72, 73, 84, 113, 126, 181, 219, 290 casualties and losses, 43 Cornwallis, Charles, 39, 41–42, 43, 72, 73, 84, 290 Gates, Horatio, 39–43, 72, 73, 84, 113, 126, 181, 290 Tarleton, Banastre, 219 Canada expedition, 43–46 Arnold, Benedict, 6, 44–45 Battle of Quebec, 45 Battle of Trois-Rivières, 46, 237 Carleton, Sir Guy, 44, 45 casualties and losses, 46 Montgomery, Richard, 44, 45

Index | 307

Montreal expedition, 44 purpose of, 43 Schuyler, Philip, 44 Siege of Quebec, 44–46 Wayne, Anthony, 237 Carleton, Sir Guy, 46–48 Battle of Quebec, 47 Battle of Valcour Island, 47, 227, 228 Burgoyne, John, and, 37, 47 Canada expedition, 44, 45, 47, 192, 193 death of, 48 early military career, 46 later years, 48 lieutenant governor of Quebec, 46–47 role in Quebec Act, 47 Seven Years’ War, 46 Siege of Quebec, 47, 192, 193 slavery and, 212 supervision of withdrawal of British troops and Loyalists, 47–48 wounding of, 46 Charles Town (Charleston), South Carolina, British Siege of, 48–51 aftermath, 51 Arbuthnot, Marriot, 49 background, 48–49 Battle of Lenud’s Ferry, 39, 51 Battle of Moncks Corner, 39, 50 British capture of Charles Town, 51, 60, 73, 78, 84, 113, 118, 149, 159, 186 British reinforcements, 50 casualties and losses, 49, 50, 51 Clinton, Sir Henry, 48–51, 60–61, 118, 149, 159, 245, 290 initial siege, 49–50 Lincoln, Benjamin, 48–50, 159, 290 Lincoln’s refusals to surrender, 50–51 prelude, 49 Prévost, Augustine, 48–49, 158 surrender of Fort Moultrie, 51 Tarleton, Banastre, 219 Woodford, William, 49 Charlottesville, Virginia, raid on, 139, 220, 291

Cherry Valley Massacre, New York, 51–53 aftermath, 53 Alden, Ichabod, 52–53 background, 51–52 Brant, Joseph, 51, 52–53 Butler, Walter, 52, 53 casualties and prisoners, 53 events of, 52–53 Chesapeake, Second Battle of the, 53–55 background, 53–54 battle, 54–55 battle lines, 54 casualties and losses, 54 de Grasse, 53–55, 78, 84, 124, 232, 291 Graves, Thomas, 53–54, 78, 124, 232, 246–247, 248 outcome and aftermath, 54–55, 61, 78, 232, 247, 291 prelude, 54 Washington, George, 53–54 Circular Letter, Massachusetts, 5, 250, 285 Clark’s Illinois campaign, 55–57 aftermath, 57 background, 55–56 capture of Fort Sackville, 57 capture of Kaskaskia, 56 Hamilton, Henry, 55, 57 occupation of Illinois Country, 56–57 Clinton, Henry, 57–61 Burgoyne, John, and, 58, 59–60 early military career, 57–58 early years and education, 57 Germain, Lord George, and, 60, 61 Howe, Sir William, and, 59, 60 King George’s War, 57 Seven Years’ War, 58 Siege of Boston, 24, 26 Siege of Charles Town, 48–51, 60–61, 118, 149, 159, 245, 290 wounding of, 58 Clinton, James. See Sullivan-Clinton expedition against the Iroquois (1779)

308 | Index

Coercive Acts, 61–63 Administration of Justice Act, 62 Boston Port Act, 62 Boston Tea Party and, 61–62 impact of, 63 Massachusetts Government Act, 62 Quartering Act, 62 Quebec Act and, 62–63 See also Quartering Act Constitution of the United States, 63–68 Anti-Federalists and, 67 Articles of Confederation and, 63–64 Bill of Rights, 5, 68, 140 executive branch, 66–67 Federalists and, 67 First Amendment, 3 judicial terms and salaries, 67 New Jersey Plan and, 65–66 New York Plan and, 65 Philadelphia Convention, 64–65 presidential election, 66–67 ratification, 67–68 selection of judges, 66 Shays’ Rebellion and, 64 slavery, 66 supermajority needed for constitutional amendments, 67 Thirteenth Amendment, 66, 93 Virginia Plan and, 65–66 Continental Army, 68–74 British southern strategy and, 72–73 Canada expedition, 70 disbanding of, 73 early militias, 69 enlistment periods, 70 first major generals, 70 foreign officers, 72 founding date of, 69 mutinies, 73 New York campaign, 71 New York Continentals, 70 pay grades, 69–70 reorganizations of, 71, 72 revision of Articles of War, 71

Second Continental Army and, 69 size of, 70 system of supply, 71–72 training regimens, 72 vote of Massachusetts Provincial Congress to raise an army, 69 Washington chosen as commander of, 70 Yorktown campaign, 73 Continental Army and George Washington, Continental Congress resolution regarding (1775) (primary document), 258–259 background, 258 on components of riflemen companies, 258 on joining the army near Boston, 258 on pay of officers and privates, 258 resolution adopting Continental Army, 258–259 resolution appointing Washington as Commander in Chief, 259 Washington’s commission, 259 on wording of enlistment, 258–259 Continental Navy, 74–79 Alliance (frigate), 76, 78 in American South, 78 Battle of Nassau, 77 changes in administration of, 75 conditions of service, 76 entry of France into the war, 78 final naval battle of the war, 78 first officers of, 76 founding and beginnings of, 74–75 frigates, 75–76 uniforms, 76 vote to obtain and equip vessels of war, 75 warships, 75 See also Bonhomme Richard versus Serapis Conway Cabal, 79–82 Adams, John, 80 Adams, Samuel, 80 aftermath, 82 civil-military tensions, 80 Conway, Thomas, 79, 80, 81, 82

Index | 309

failure of, 82 Gates, Horatio, 79–81, 82, 113, 230 Lee, Richard Henry, 80 Lovell, James, 80 Mifflin, Thomas, 79, 80, 81 purpose of, 79 reorganization of Board of War, 80, 81 Washington, George, 79–82, 113 Cornwallis, Charles, 1st Marquess, 82–85 Battle of Brandywine, 32, 33, 83 Battle of Guilford Courthouse, 84, 126, 127–128, 129, 164, 245, 291 Battle of Monmouth, 84 Camden campaign, 39, 41–42, 43, 72, 73, 84, 290 death of, 84 early years and education, 82–83 George III and, 61, 83, 84 Howe, Sir William, and, 83 in Ireland, 84 leadership of, 83, 84–85 Seven Years’ War, 83 surrender at Yorktown, 73, 84, 118, 124, 126, 221, 248, 279, 291 Yorktown campaign, 245–247 Cowpens, Battle of, 85–87 aftermath, 86–87 background, 85 battle, 86 casualties and losses, 86, 220 Greene, Nathanael, 85–87, 126 Morgan, Daniel, 85, 86–87, 126, 181, 219–220, 291 prelude, 85–86 Tarleton, Banastre, 85–86, 89, 181, 219–220, 291 Dan River, race to the, 89–91 Cornwallis at Ramsur’s Mill, 89 Cornwallis’s crossing of Catawba River, 90 final leg, 90–91 Greene and Morgan at Guilford Courthouse, 90 Greene’s arrival at Catawba River, 89

Greene’s crossing of Dan River, 90 Greene’s division of his force, 90 Greene’s waiting at Cheraw Hills, 89 Morgan’s crossing of Catawba River, 89 Morgan’s crossing of Yadkin River, 90 purpose of, 89 Declaration of Independence, 91–93 adoption of, 91 Jefferson, Thomas, and, 1, 92–93, 119, 139, 190, 191, 261–264 “legal brief ” structure of, 92–93 pledge and signatories, 93 resolutions of Richard Henry Lee, 92 significance of, 93 wide appeal of, 92 Declaration of Independence (1776) (primary document), 261–264 background, 261 declaration of national rights, 261–262 list of grievances, 262–263 preamble, 261 resolution, 263–264 response to, 261 Declaratory Act, 93–95 catalyst for, 93–94 impact of, 94–95 Irish Declaratory Act and, 94 provisions of, 94 Declaratory Act (1766) (primary document), 249–250 background, 249 declaration of authority of Parliament in America, 249–250 declaration of lack of authority in colonies to void laws, 250 preamble, 249 response to, 249 D’Estaing, Jean Baptiste Charles Henri Hector, comte, 195–198 Dickinson, John, 8, 63 Dunmore, John Murray, 4th Earl of, 76–77, 174, 209–210, 212, 253 Enlightenment, 102, 107

310 | Index

Ferguson, Patrick, 50, 145–146 Flintlock musket, 97–99 British Brown Bess, 98 carbines, musketoons, and blunderbusses, 98–99 description of, 97 French Charleville, 98 frizzen, 97 as improved snaplock, 97 inaccuracy and unreliability of, 97–98 Fort Stanwix, New York, Siege of, 99–101 aftermath, 101 Arnold, Benedict, 7, 100–101 background, 99 battle, 100–101 Brant, Joseph, 99, 100, 203 casualties and losses, 100, 101 prelude, 99–100 Schuyler, Philip, 100–101 St. Leger, Barrimore “Barry,” 99, 100, 101 Fox, Ebenezer, prison narrative of (1779) (primary document), 275–277 on allowance and quality of food, 275 background, 275 on confined spaces, 275 on daily schedules and routines, 276 on death and burial, 276–277 on impurity of water, 275 on inhabitants of lower region, 275–276 on nighttime, 276 on prisoners fresh from New England, 276 France and the American Revolutionary War, 101–106 aftermath and analysis, 105 Beaumarchais, Pierre de, 103 Enlightenment, 102 financial assistance, 102–103 Franco-American Treaty of Alliance, 103, 107, 288 French power and wealth, 101 Great Britain’s declaration of war on France, 104

key figures, 104 Louis XVI, 102, 103, 124, 151, 206, 232 military assistance, 103 Saratoga campaign, 103 Second Battle of the Chesapeake, 104 Treaty of Amity and Commerce, 103 Turgot, Anne-Robert-Jacques, Baron de Laune, 102–103 Vergennes, Charles Gravier, comte de, 102, 103 See also Lafayette, Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de; Vimeur, Jean-Baptiste Donatien de, Comte de Rochambeau Franklin, Benjamin, 106–108 Adams, John, and, 2 Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, 107–108 Constitutional Convention, 107, 221, 222 death of, 108 on Declaratory Act, 94 diplomatic missions to Europe, 106, 107 early years, 106 Experiments and Observations on Electricity, 106 French and Indian War, 106 Howe, Sir William, and, 121, 131 Jones, John Paul, and, 21, 142, 143 later years, 107–108 Mecom, Jane (Franklin’s sister), 240 opposition to the Stamp Act, 106 Paine, Thomas, and, 189, 266 Poor Richard’s Almanac, 21 printing career, 106 role in Declaration of Independence, 92, 139, 261, 264 role in Franco-American Treaty of Alliance, 107, 288 role in Treaty of Paris, 107, 221, 222, 279–280 Second Continental Congress, 107 Steuben, Friedrich von, and, 214, 230 Freeman’s Farm, Battle of (First Battle of Saratoga), 7, 112, 180, 205, 288

Index | 311

French and Indian War, 285 aftermath, 62, 191 Arnold, Benedict, 6 Battle of the Monongahela, 109, 159–160, 234 Declaration of Independence and, 91 economic impact of, 29, 94 Fort Stanwix built during, 99 Franklin, Benjamin, and, 106 French defeat, 102 Gage, Thomas, 109–110 Howe, Sir William, 134 Lee, Charles, 152 Morgan, Daniel, 180 Schuyler, Philip, 206 settler-Mohawk relations during, 51 Washington, George, 216, 233, 258 See also Seven Years’ War; Treaty of Paris Gage, Thomas, 109–111 American Revolution, 111 Battle of the Monongahela, 109 Battles of Lexington and Concord, 154–155, 157 early years and education, 109 French and Indian War, 109–110 governor of Massachusetts, 110–111 governor of Montreal, 110 later years and death, 111 Siege of Boston, 23–24, 25, 111 War of the Austrian Succession, 109 wounding of, 109 See also Lexington and Concord, Thomas Gage’s report on Battles of (1775) (primary document) Gates, Horatio, 111–114 Board of War leadership, 80, 81, 113, 167, 230 Burgoyne, John, and, 112 Camden campaign, 39–43, 72, 73, 84, 113, 126, 181, 290 commander of Northern Department, 112 Conway Cabal and, 79–81, 82, 113, 230 early years and career, 111–112 later years and death, 113

Morgan, Daniel, and, 180–181 Newburgh Conspiracy and, 184 Saratoga campaign, 40, 112, 167, 204–206, 268, 288 Schuyler, Philip, and, 112, 207–208 Seven Years’ War, 111 George III, King of Great Britain, 114–116 ascends to the throne, 285 Cornwallis, George, and, 61, 83, 84 death of, 115 Declaration of Independence and, 92, 93, 262–263 declares American colonies to be in rebellion, 174, 260–261, 286 declares formal end to hostilities in America, 292 empowered to make peace with former colonies, 221, 292 Germain, Lord George, and, 116, 117, 118 on hearing of Second Battle of the Chesapeake, 55 Ireland and, 115 mental and physical health, 115 Proclamation Act of 1763, 285 Seven Years’ War, 114 Stamp Act, 114 See also Royal Proclamation declaring the colonies in rebellion (1775) (primary document) Germain, Lord George, 116–118 on Battle of Trenton, 225 Clinton, Sir Henry, and, 60, 61 early years and education, 116 Gage, Horatio, and, 109, 111 George III and, 116, 117, 118 Howe, Sir William, and, 135–136 inheritance and name change, 116 North, Frederick, and, 186 Saratoga campaign and, 201 Seven Years’ War, 116 See also British Southern Strategy (1779) (primary document); West Indies, impact on British Strategy (1779) (primary document)

312 | Index

German forces, 118–120 anti-German propaganda, 119 German prisoners of war, 120 Hessians, 118 life in armies of German states, 119 military training, 119 organization of German auxiliary units, 119–120 statistics, 118 Germantown, Battle of, 120–123 background, 120–121 battle, 121–123 casualties and losses, 122, 123 Greene, Nathanael, 126 Howe, Sir William, 120, 122–123, 135, 228–229, 288 Knox, Henry, 147 Knyphausen, Wilhelm, 149 prelude, 121 Washington, George, 121, 122, 123, 235 Wayne, Anthony, 121, 122–123, 238 “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death” (1775) (primary document), 253–254 background, 253 on conduct of the British, 254 on differences of thought, 253 on illusions of hope, 254 on not holding back opinions, 253 on strength and bravery, 254–255 on war having already begun, 255 Grasse-Tilly, François-Joseph-Paul, Comte de, 123–125 Battle of the Saintes, 124, 292 early career, 123 early years and education, 123 later years and death, 124 Second Battle of the Chesapeake, 53–55, 78, 84, 124, 232, 291 Seven Years’ War, 123 wounding of, 123 Yorktown campaign, 124, 235, 245, 246–247 Greene, Nathanael, 125–127 Battle of Brandywine, 31, 32, 33

Battle of Cowpens, 85–87, 126 Battle of Eutaw Springs, 291 Battle of Germantown, 121, 122–123, 126 Battle of Guilford Courthouse, 90, 126, 127, 128–129, 164, 245, 291 Battle of Harlem Heights, 125–126 Battle of Hobkirk’s Hill, 126, 291 Battle of Long Island, 168–169, 170 Battle of Monmouth, 126, 177–178, 179 Battle of Rhode Island, 198 early career, 125 early years and education, 125 later years and death, 127 leadership of, 126–127 race to the Dan River, 89–91, 126 Rhode Island campaign, 195, 197–198 Siege of Boston, 25, 27, 125 at Valley Forge, 229 Guilford Courthouse, Battle of, 127–129 aftermath, 129 background, 127 battle, 128–129 casualties and losses, 129 Cornwallis, Charles, 84, 126, 127–128, 129, 164, 245, 291 Greene, Nathanael, 90, 126, 127, 128–129, 164, 245, 291 prelude, 127–128 Tarleton, Banastre, 220 Hamilton, Alexander Adams, John, and, 2, 3 Constitution of the United States and, 63, 65 Jefferson, Thomas, and, 140–141 Newburgh Conspiracy and, 183 Schuyler, Philip, and, 208 Secretary of the Treasury, 140–141, 235–236 Steuben, Friedrich von, and, 215 Warren, Mercy Otis, and, 240 Hamilton, Henry, 55, 57

Index | 313

Hancock, John, 20, 24, 154, 155, 261, 264 Heath, William, 25, 69, 70, 157, 246 Henry, Patrick, 55, 81. See also “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death” (1775) (primary document) Howe, Richard, 1st Earl Howe, 131–133 Battle of Germantown and, 120–121 “Black Dick” (nickname), 131 commander of North America Station, 131 early career, 131 evacuation of Philadelphia, 132 later years and death, 133 New York campaign, 78, 132, 134–135 peace commissioner, 131–132 political career, 131 resignation of, 133 Rhode Island campaign, 196 Seven Years’ War, 131 Howe, William, 5th Viscount, 120, 131, 133–136, 163 Battle of Brandywine, 30–31, 32–33, 34, 135, 228–229, 288 Battle of Bunker Hill, 25, 35, 111, 134 Battle of Germantown, 120, 288 Battle of Long Island, 32, 135, 168, 169, 170, 171 Battle of Trenton and, 223 capture of Philadelphia, 60, 229, 269 Clinton, Sir Henry, and, 59, 60 commander of British forces in North America, 59, 117, 286 Cornwallis, Charles, and, 83 early career, 133–134 early life and education, 133 evacuation of Boston, 25, 168 expedition to Quebec, 134 Germain, Lord George, and, 117 later years and death, 136 New York campaign, 117, 134–135, 264, 265 Paine, Thomas, on, 267, 269 resignation of, 60, 136, 177 Saratoga campaign, 201, 204

Seven Year’s War, 134 Siege of Boston, 24–25, 26–27, 134 Hutchinson, Thomas, 4, 28, 29–30 Indentured servants, 173 Infantry tactics. See Linear tactics Jay Treaty, 223, 236 Jefferson, Thomas, 139–141 Adams, John, and, 2, 140–141 Declaration of Independence, 1, 92–93, 119, 139, 190, 191, 261–264 early career, 139 early years and education, 139 elected vice president (1796), 140 governor of Virginia, 40, 139, 214, 220 later years and death, 141 minister to France, 139–140 presidential election of 1800, 3, 141 presidential election of 1804, 141 purchase of Louisiana Territory, 141 Second Continental Congress, 139 secretary of state, 140 Warren, Mercy Otis, and, 240 Jones, John Paul, 75, 78, 142–144 Bonhomme Richard versus Serapis, 17, 21–22, 76, 142–143, 290 command of Ranger, 142 early years, 142 later years and death, 143 New Providence Island Expedition, 142 Kings Mountain, Battle of, 84, 145–146 aftermath, 146 background, 145 battle, 146 casualties and losses, 146 Ferguson, Patrick, 145–146 outcome, 145, 176, 290 prelude, 145–146 Knox, Henry, 146–148 Battle of Brandywine, 33, 147 Battle of Germantown, 122, 147 Battle of Long Island, 147

314 | Index

Knox, Henry (Continued) Battle of Monmouth, 147 Battle of Princeton, 147 Battle of Trenton, 147, 224 death of, 147 early years and education, 146 founding of organizations and societies, 147 Greene, Nathanael, and, 125 Quasi-War, 147 secretary of war, 147 Shays’ Rebellion, 147 Siege of Boston, 26, 146–147 transport by oxen and sledge, 147, 166 witness to Boston Massacre, 146 Yorktown siege strategy, 147, 247 Knyphausen, Wilhelm, Freiherr von Innhausen und, 148–150 Battle of Brandywine, 32, 33, 149 Battle of Germantown, 121, 149 Battle of White Horse Tavern, 149 Battle of Whitemarsh, 149 early career, 148 early years and education, 148 on German forces, 120 later years and death, 149 New Jersey campaign, 149 Philadelphia campaign, 149 Lafayette, Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de, 104, 151–152 arrival in Philadelphia, 151 Battle of Barren Hill, 149, 151 Battle of Brandywine, 31, 72, 151 Battle of Monmouth, 151, 178 Conway Cabal and, 80, 81, 82 early years and career, 151 farewell tour of United States, 152 French Revolution, 152 house arrest for having joined American army, 151 later years and death, 152 Rhode Island campaign, 151, 195–196, 197, 198

Rochambeau and, 151, 231 at Valley Forge, 151 Washington, George, and, 151 wounding of, 72, 151 Yorktown campaign, 152, 232, 245, 246 Laurens, Henry, 84, 279 Laurens, John, 154, 189–190 Lee, Charles, 152–154 Battle of Monmouth, 154, 177–179, 235 capture of, 154, 167, 219, 223, 265 cooperation with the British, 153 court martial, 154 death of, 154 early career, 152–153 migration to America, 153 on militia forces, 175 Washington, George, and, 153–154 Lee, Richard Henry, 1, 75, 80, 92, 261, 264, 287 Lee, William, 210 Lexington and Concord, Battles of, 154–157 aftermath, 156–157, 260 background, 154 Barrett, James, 156 Barrett Farm, 156 casualties and losses, 156, 157 first shot, 156 Gage, Thomas, 154–155, 157 Heath, William, 157 militiamen at, 23, 69, 111, 174 North Bridge, 156, 256 Parker, John, 156, 255 Patriot logistics, 164–165 Percy, Hugh, 155, 157 Pitcairn, John, 155, 156 prelude, 154–155 return march, 156 Smith, Francis, 155–157 Lexington and Concord, Thomas Gage’s report on Battles of (1775) (primary document), 255–258 on advance to Concord, 257 on arrival at Lexington, 256–257 background, 255–256

Index | 315

on casualties and losses, 258 on destruction of military stores, 257 on hostilities on the march back from Concord, 257–258 on initial march toward Concord, 256 on intelligence of King’s Troops, 256 on landing of Colonel Smith, 256 on orders not to fire unless fired upon, 256 on sight of scalped and injured soldiers, 257 writing of, 255–256 Lincoln, Abraham, 93 Lincoln, Benjamin, 157–159 Battle of Bemis Heights, 158 Battle of Bennington, 158 Battle of White Plains, 158 death of, 159 early career, 157–158 Saratoga campaign, 158, 205 Shays’ Rebellion, 159 Siege of Boston, 158 Siege of Charles Town, 48, 49–50, 51, 73, 113, 158–159 Siege of Yorktown, 159 Washington, George, and, 158, 159 wounding of, 158 Linear tactics, 159–161 definition and naming of, 159 loading and firing drills, 160 skirmishers, 160–161 smoke, 161 smoothbore flintlock musket and, 159–160 socket bayonet, 160 troop discipline, 160, 161 Logistics, British, 161–164 bread and flour, 163 foraging for supplies, 163 land transport, 162–163 shipping by sea, 161–162 shipping problems, 163–164 supplies and provisions, 161–164 Victualling Board, 161, 162 wagons, 162–163

Logistics, Patriot, 164–168 Army of New England, 164 Battle of Bunker Hill, 165 Battle of Trenton, 167 Battles of Lexington and Concord, 164–165 Board of War and, 166, 167 Congress’s Committee of Safety, 166 definition of logistics, 164 France and, 167–168 militiamen, 165 New York campaign, 166 Second Continental Congress and, 165 Valley Forge and, 167 Washington, George, and, 165–166 weaponry and artillery, 166 Long Island, Battle of, 168–171 aftermath, 171 Alexander, William, 168, 170 background, 168 battle, 170–171 casualties and losses, 171 Grant, James, 170 Greene, Nathanael, 125, 168–169, 170 Howe, Sir William, 32, 135, 168, 169, 170, 171 Knox, Henry, 147 prelude, 168–170 Putnam, Israel, 170, 171 Washington, George, 169–171, 234 Washington’s evacuation of Long Island, 171, 234, 287 Marshall, John, 3 Massachusetts Circular Letter, 5, 250, 285 Midnight Judges, 3 Militias, Loyalist and Patriot, 173–176 debate over militia versus regular army, 175 definition of militias, 173 eligibility and requirements, 173 Loyalist militia, 175–176

316 | Index

Militias, Loyalist and Patriot (Continued) muster days, 173–174 in New England colonies, 174 origins of, 173 Patriot militia, 174–175 in Virginia, New York, and Massachusetts, 174–175 Monmouth, Battle of, 176–180 aftermath, 179 background, 176–177 battle, 178–179 casualties and losses, 179 Greene, Nathanael, 126, 177–178, 179 Knox, Henry, 147 Lafayette, 151, 178 Lee, Charles, 154, 177–179, 235 outcome, 179 prelude, 177–178 Washington, George, 72, 177–179, 230, 235 Wayne, Anthony, 178, 238 Montgomery, Richard, 6, 44–45, 47, 70, 192–193, 207, 287, 288 Morgan, Daniel, 180–181 Battle of Cowpens, 85, 86–87, 126, 181, 219–220, 291 Canada expedition, 45, 192–193 early life, 180 later years and death, 181 militia forces and, 175 race to the Dan River, 89–90 Saratoga campaign, 180, 205–206 Siege of Boston, 180 Morristown, congressional report on (1780) (primary document), 277–279 background, 277 on current state of soldiers, 278–279 on medical departments, 279 on need for supplies and relief, 279 on provisions in camp, 279 Musketry, 181–182 casualties from, 182 definition of, 181 firing by grand divisions, 182 inaccuracy of, 181–182

rapidity of fire versus accuracy, 182 volley fire, 182 Newburgh Conspiracy, 182–184 aftermath, 184 failure of, 184 Gates, Horatio, and, 113, 184 motivation for, 183 nationalists and, 183 Newburgh Address, 184 Washington, George, and, 183, 184 Newport, Battle of. See Rhode Island campaign and Battle of Rhode Island North, Frederick, 2nd Earl of Guilford, 184–187 early years and education, 184–185 Falklands Crisis of 1770, 185 George III and, 185 on hearing of Cornwall’s surrender, 186 later life and death, 186–187 political career, 185 prime minister, 185 rebellion in American colonies, 185–186 resignation of, 186 Seven Years’ War, 185 support for Papist Act of 1778, 186 war costs, 186 Paine, Thomas, 189–190 The Age of Reason, 190 American Crisis, 189 Common Sense, 91, 189, 266 early career, 189 later years and death, 190 The Rights of Man, 190 signatory to Declaration of Independence, 264 views of, 189–190 See also American Crisis, The (1776) (primary document) Parker, John, 156, 255 Parker, Peter, 59, 287 Pitt, William the Elder, 36, 62, 185 Pitt, William the Younger, 115 Preston, Thomas, 28, 252

Index | 317

Prévost, Augustine, 48–49, 158, 270, 274 Princeton, Battle of, 59, 71, 83, 126, 135, 147, 163, 224–225, 235, 287 Putnam, Israel, 24, 35, 70, 170, 171 Quartering Act, 62, 191–192 impact of, 191 as part of Coercive Acts, 191 provisions of, 191 received by colonists, 191 Quasi-War, 3, 147 Quebec, Siege and Battle of, 192–193 Arnold, Benedict, 192–193 background, 192 battle, 193 Carleton, Sir Guy, 192–193 casualties and losses, 45, 193 Montgomery, Richard, 192–193 prelude, 192 Wooster, David, 193 Rhode Island campaign and Battle of Rhode Island, 195–199 arrival of French warships, 196 background, 195 Battle of Rhode Island (Battle of Newport), 126, 197–198, 217, 289 casualties and losses, 196, 198 D’Estaing, 195–198 Glover, John, 195, 197 Greene, Nathanael, 195, 197–198 Lafayette, 151, 195–196, 197, 198 Pigot, Sir Robert, 196, 197, 198 prelude, 196–197 Sullivan, John, 195, 196, 197–198 Varnum, James, 195, 197 Rochambeau. See Vimeur, Jean-Baptiste Donatien de, Comte de Rochambeau Royal Proclamation declaring the colonies in rebellion (1775) (primary document), 260–261 background, 260 on obligation by law for all to aid and assist in suppression of the rebellion, 260

on obligation of officers to suppress the rebellion and bring traitors to justice, 260 on obligation to make known treasons and traitorous conspiracies, 260–261 preamble, 260 Rush, Benjamin, 80, 81, 264 Rush, Benjamin, letter to Patrick Henry (1778) (primary document), 268–269 aftermath of, 268 background, 268 on dreary wilderness ahead, 268–269 on lack of discipline, 269 on liberal spirit of thinking, 268 on need for secrecy, 269 on need to replace Washington, 269 on the sick and dying, 269 Saratoga campaign, 201–206 aftermath, 37, 40, 60, 103, 117, 206, 235 Arnold, Benedict, 7, 203, 205, 206 background, 201 Battle of Hubbardton, 202 Battle of Oriskany, 100, 203, 217 Battle of Skenesborough, 202–203 Burgoyne, John, 201–206, 235, 288 casualties and losses, 204, 206 First Battle of Saratoga (Battle of Freeman’s Farm), 7, 112, 180, 205, 288 France and, 103 Gates, Horatio, 40, 112, 167, 204–206, 268, 288 Howe, Sir William, 201, 202, 204 Morgan, Daniel, 180, 205, 206–207 prelude, 202 Schuyler, Philip, 202–205, 207–208 Second Battle of Saratoga (Battle of Bemis Heights), 7, 37, 112, 158, 180, 205–206, 288 surrender of Burgoyne, 20, 37, 47, 72, 112, 117, 132, 135, 186, 206, 228, 230, 235 three-pronged plan, 201–202 See also Bennington, Battle of; Fort Stanwix, New York, Siege of

318 | Index

Schuyler, Philip, 206–208 commander of Northern Department, 112, 207 congressional report on Morristown, 279 court martial and vindication, 208 early years, 206 French and Indian War, 206 Gates, Horatio, and, 112, 207–208 Hamilton, Alexander, and, 208 landowner, 206–207 later years and death, 208 militiamen and, 175 Montreal expedition, 44, 70 planning for invasion of Canada, 207, 286 political career, 207, 208 resolution of Continental Congress adopting the Continental Army, 259 Saratoga campaign, 202–205, 207–208 Second Continental Congress, 207 Siege of Fort Stanwix, 100–101 Seven Years’ War Battle of Minden, 83, 116–117, 151 Battle of Minorca, 231 Battle of Zorndorf, 182 Burgoyne, John, 36, 46 Carleton, Sir Guy, 46 Clinton, Sir Henry, 58 Cornwallis, Charles, 83 defense of Louisbourg, 123 economic impact of, 29, 185 expedition against St. Malo, France, 116 French defeat, 102 Gates, Horatio, 111 George III, 114 Germain, Lord George, 116 Howe, Sir William, 131, 134 Knyphausen, Wilhelm, 148 Rochambeau, 231 Royal Navy in, 74 Steuben, Friedrich von, 214 See also French and Indian War Slavery, 208–213 antislavery movement, 93, 108, 209, 211–212

Black soldiers, 211 British role in antislavery movement, 209–211 Constitution of the United States and, 66 Declaration of Independence and, 93, 261 Dunmore’s Proclamation, 209–210, 212 in Georgia, 209 militias and, 173 in New England, 209 in New York and New Jersey, 209 in North Carolina and Maryland, 208–209 Phillipsburg Proclamation, 210, 212 plantations and, 208–209, 210, 211, 212 runaway slaves, 209, 211, 212, 213 slave quarters, 208 slave rebellion, 27 slave trade, 115, 142 slaves deserted by owners, 211 slaves employed to build defensive works, 49 statistics, 208–209 Thirteenth Amendment, 66, 93 tobacco farming and, 208 Treaty of Paris and, 212–213, 222 in Virginia, 208 war and, 209–212 Washington, George, and, 210, 211, 212 women and, 242–243 Smallpox, 26, 46, 47, 193, 210, 223, 229 Stamp Act colonists’ opposition to, 1, 4, 29, 106, 110, 114 Declaratory Act and, 93–94, 249 passage of, 285 Quartering Act and, 191 repeal of, 5, 29, 94, 285 Stamp Act riots, 4–5 Townshend Acts and, 5, 29, 250 Stark, John, 19–20, 35, 158, 204 Steuben, Friedrich von, 213–215 drill and maneuvers instructor, 72, 160, 161, 179, 214, 230, 234 early career, 214 early years, 213–214

Index | 319

Hamilton, Alexander, and, 215 inspector general of the Continental Army, 72, 161, 213, 214, 230 later years and death, 215 Regulations for the Order and Discipline of the Troops of the United States (“Blue Book”), 214 Seven Years’ War, 214 Siege of Yorktown, 214–215 Sullivan, John, 70 Battle of Brandywine, 33 Battle of Germantown, 121, 122 Battle of Long Island, 170 Canada expedition, 46 Rhode Island campaign, 195, 196, 197–198 See also Sullivan-Clinton expedition against the Iroquois (1779) Sullivan-Clinton expedition against the Iroquois (1779), 215–218 aftermath, 217 background, 215–216 Battle of Newtown, 217 casualties and losses, 217 genocide and, 217 order for total war, 216 purpose of, 215, 289 reluctance of Iroquois to go to war, 217 two-pronged attack plan, 216 Tarleton, Banastre, 219–220 Battle of Camden, 40, 41, 42, 43, 181, 219 Battle of Cowpens, 85–86, 89, 181, 219–220, 291 Battle of Fishing Creek, 43, 219 Battle of Green Spring, 220 Battle of Guilford Courthouse, 220 Battle of the Waxhaws, 219, 290 early years and education, 219 later years and death, 220 race to the Dan River, 89, 91 raid on Charlottesville, 139, 220 Siege of Charles Town, 50, 51, 219 Siege of Yorktown, 220 Tarleton’s Green Horse, 219

Tea Party movement, 30. See also Boston Tea Party Townshend Acts, 94, 110 Adams, Samuel, and, 5 Boston Massacre and, 27 Boston Tea Party and, 29 North, Frederick, and, 185 provisions of, 29 women and, 240 Townshend Acts (1767) (primary document), 250–251 background, 250 on collection of revenue, 251 on legal search and seizure, 251 preamble, 250 response to, 250 on uses of revenue, 251 Treaty of Paris, 220–223 Adams, John, and, 2, 221, 222, 279, 280, 283 Fox-North coalition government and, 222 Franklin, Benjamin, and, 221, 222 Jay, John, and, 221, 222 negotiations, 221–222 Oswald, Richard, and, 221–222 prelude to, 220–221 Rockingham and, 221–222 Shelburne and, 222 slavery and, 212–213, 222 Treaty of Paris (1783) (primary document), 279–283 on access to Mississippi River, 283 background, 279–280 on confiscated lands and land rights, 282 on established boundaries, 281 on fishing rights, 281–282 on free sovereign and independent states, 281 on payment of lawful contracted debts, 282 preamble, 280 on prisoners of war, 282–283 on return of captured territories, 283 on terms of ratification, 283

320 | Index

Trenton, New Jersey, Battle of, 223–225 aftermath, 224–225 background, 223 battle, 224 casualties and losses, 224 German prisoners captured at, 120 Greene, Nathanael, 126, 224 Howe, Sir William, 223 Knox, Henry, 147, 224 prelude, 223–224 Sullivan, John, 224 Washington, George, 71, 83, 189, 223–225, 235, 287 See also Princeton, Battle of Valcour Island, Battle of, 227–228 aftermath, 228 Arnold, Benedict, 47, 227–228 background, 228 battle, 227–228 British victory, 228, 287 casualties and losses, 228 Pringle, Thomas, 228 Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, 228–230, 235 congressional politics, 229–230 construction of encampment and defense lines, 229 Conway Cabal and, 79, 80, 81 drill and maneuver instruction of Friedrich von Steuben, 72, 161, 214, 230 harsh conditions and lack of supplies, 167, 229 Knox, Henry, at, 147 Lafayette at, 151 Morgan, Daniel, at, 180 Wayne, Anthony, at, 238 winter headquarters established at, 288 women at, 240 Vimeur, Jean-Baptiste Donatien de, Comte de Rochambeau, 231–232 arrest and imprisonment during Reign of Terror, 232 Battle of Minorca, 231

early years and education, 231 later years and death, 232 Second Battle of the Chesapeake, 54, 232 Seven Years’ War, 231 Siege of Maastricht, 231 War of the Austrian Succession, 231 Washington, George, and, 231 wounding of, 231 Yorktown campaign, 84, 232, 235, 245, 246, 247–248, 291 War of 1812, 214, 223 War of the Austrian Succession, 46, 109, 116, 123, 148, 231 Ward, Artemas, 23, 24, 25, 27, 70 Washington, George, 233–237 administration and cabinet, 140, 235–236 Battle of Brandywine, 30–32, 33, 34, 72, 121, 135, 204, 229, 235, 288 Battle of Brooklyn, 234 Battle of Fort Necessity, 233 Battle of Germantown, 121, 122, 123, 235 Battle of Long Island, 169–171, 234 Battle of Monmouth, 72, 177–179, 230, 235 Battle of Princeton, 83, 235 Battle of the Monongahela, 234 Battle of Trenton, 71, 83, 189, 223–225, 235, 287 commander of Continental Army, 24, 68, 70–73, 234 Constitutional Convention, 64–65 Conway Cabal and, 79–82, 113 death of, 237 early career, 233 early years, 233 elected first president of United States, 235 farewell address, 236–237 First Continental Congress, 234 French and Indian War, 216, 233–234, 258

Index | 321

Lafayette and, 151 leadership of, 71, 175, 234 Lee, Charles, and, 153–154 legacies of, 237 Lincoln, Benjamin, and, 158, 159 marriage to Martha Custis, 234 New York campaign, 71, 135, 234–235 Newburgh Conspiracy and, 183, 184 Patriot logistics, 165–166 Second Battle of the Chesapeake, 53–54 Second Continental Congress, 234 Siege of Boston, 24, 25–26, 27, 71, 146–147, 234 slavery and, 210, 211, 212 Sullivan-Clinton expedition and, 216 at Valley Forge, 228–230 Whiskey Rebellion, 236 Yorktown campaign, 73, 84, 104, 232, 235, 245–248 See also Continental Army and George Washington, Continental Congress resolution regarding (1775) (primary document), 258–259 Washington, George, letter to John Augustine Washington (1776) (primary document), 264–266 background, 264 on bad situation of current military affairs, 265 on captivity of General Lee, 265 on consequences of short enlistments, 265 on most recent letter, 264–265 on personal perplexity and difficulties, 266 Washington, William, 39, 50, 51, 85, 128 Washington’s Navy, 25, 74 Wayne, Anthony, 237–239 Battle of Brandywine, 33, 237–238 Battle of Fallen Timbers, 147, 236, 239 Battle of Germantown, 121, 122–123, 238

Battle of Monmouth, 178, 238 Battle of Stony Point, 289 Battle of Trois-Rivières, 237 death of, 239 early years and education, 237 later years, 238–239 Lee, Charles, and, 154 political career, 237, 239 raid on Bull’s Ferry, 238 Siege of Yorktown, 238 Treaty of Greenville, 239 wounding of, 237, 238 West Indies, impact on British Strategy (1779) (primary document), 272–274 on exchanging troops as prisoners of war, 274 on health of troops, 274 on letters of service for officers, 274 on shuttling of troops, 273–274 Women, 239–243 African American women, 242–243 in British forces in New York, 240 in Continental Army force at Valley Forge, 240 Corbin, Margaret Cochran, 241 education, 242 in German units, 240 impact of American Revolution on, 242 Ladies Association in Philadelphia, 240 Loyalists, 241–242 marriage, 242 Native American women, 243 participation in boycotts, 240 percentage of camp populations, 239– 240 race and socioeconomics, 242 Rind, Clementina, 240 soldiers who disguised their gender, 241 spinning and quilting bees, 240 Warren, Mercy Otis, 240–241 Washington, Martha, 240 XYZ Affair, 2–3

322 | Index

Yorktown campaign, 245–248 aftermath, 104–105, 183, 248 background, 245 British southern strategy and, 186 casualties and losses, 248 Continental Navy, 78 Cornwallis, Charles, 245–247 de Grasse, 124, 245, 246–247 Graves, Thomas, 246–247, 248 Hood, Samuel, 246–247 Knox, Henry, 147, 247

Lafayette, 152, 245, 246 Lincoln, Benjamin, 159 prelude, 245–247 Rochambeau, 232, 245, 246, 247–248 Siege of Yorktown, 149, 159, 166, 215, 220, 238, 247–248 surrender of Cornwallis, 73, 84, 118, 124, 126, 221, 248, 279, 291 Tarleton, Banastre, 220 Washington, George, 235, 245–248 Wayne, Anthony, 238