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Liberty's Kids 101 - The Boston Tea Party (Pilot, Part I)

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Watch to find out how the King of England responded to the Boston Tea Party

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Liberty's Kids 102 - Intolerable Acts (Pilot,Part II)

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Liberty Kids:  Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death

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Liberty Kids:  Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death

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Liberty's Kids HD 105 - The Midnight Ride | History Cartoons for Children

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Liberty Kids:  The Shot Hear Round the World

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Liberty Kids:  The Shot Hear Round the World

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The Battle of Lexington

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Liberty's Kids 106 - The Shot Heard 'Round the World

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Liberty's Kids HD 110 - Washington Takes Command | History Videos For Kids

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Liberty's Kids HD 119 - Across The Delaware | History Cartoons for Children

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Liberty's Kids HD 131 - Bostonians | History Cartoons for Children

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Learn how former slave, James Armistead helped the Patriots by spying.

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Liberty's Kids 136 - Yorktown | History Cartoons For Children

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Revolutionary War Series:  Events Leading Up to the War

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Revolutionary War Series:  Events Leading Up to the War

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Watch to learn all about the things that happened before the war.

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The Revolutionary War Series  The Events Leading Up to War

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Events Leading to the American Revolutionary War

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Events Leading to the American Revolutionary War

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Watch to learn about 4 big events that led to the Revolutionary War.

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Events Leading to the American Revolutionary War

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Causes of the American Revolution:  Countdown to Independence

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Causes of the American Revolution:  Countdown to Independence

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Watch to learn all about the causes of the Revolutionary War

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Causes of the American Revolution  Countdown to Independence

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Learn about why the colonists became unhappy with the king they once loved.

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schoolhouse rock no more king educational

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Watch a re-enactment of Patrick Henry's famous speech about the need for freedom from England.

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Learn about the feelings in the colonies after the French and Indian War as well as the Boston Massacre

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Watch to learn how the King tried to pay for his costs of the French and Indian War.

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Watch to learn the basics about the French and Indian war which was the first event that led up to the Revolutionary War.

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The French and Indian War Explained | History

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The Wigmaker's Boy and the Boston Massacre

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The Wigmaker's Boy and the Boston Massacre

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This is a primary source. That means it is an account of what happened by someone who was actually there.

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Create a new document and edit with others at the same time -- from your computer, phone or tablet. Get stuff done with or without an internet connection. Use Docs to edit Word files. Free from Google.

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This is one of the events leading up to the Revolution.

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Create a new document and edit with others at the same time -- from your computer, phone or tablet. Get stuff done with or without an internet connection. Use Docs to edit Word files. Free from Google.

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Learn about Paul Revere's Ride on History.com.

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On April 18, 1775, British troops march out of Boston on a mission to confiscate the American arsenal at Concord and to capture Patriot leaders Samuel Adams and John Hancock, known to be hiding at Lexington. As the British departed, Boston Patriots Paul Revere and William Dawes set out on horseback from the city to warn Adams and Hancock and rouse the Minutemen.

By 1775, tensions between the American colonies and the British government had approached the breaking point, especially in Massachusetts, where Patriot leaders formed a shadow revolutionary government and trained militias to prepare for armed conflict with the British troops occupying Boston. In the spring of 1775, General Thomas Gage, the British governor of Massachusetts, received instructions from Great Britain to seize all stores of weapons and gunpowder accessible to the American insurgents. On April 18, he ordered British troops to march against Concord and Lexington.

The Boston Patriots had been preparing for such a British military action for some time, and, upon learning of the British plan, Revere and Dawes set off across the Massachusetts countryside. They took separate routes in case one of them was captured: Dawes left the city via the Boston Neck peninsula and Revere crossed the Charles River to Charlestown by boat. As the two couriers made their way, Patriots in Charlestown waited for a signal from Boston informing them of the British troop movement. As previously agreed, one lantern would be hung in the steeple of Boston's Old North Church, the highest point in the city, if the British were marching out of the city by Boston Neck, and two lanterns would be hung if they were crossing the Charles River to Cambridge. Two lanterns were hung, and the armed Patriots set out for Lexington and Concord accordingly. Along the way, Revere and Dawes roused hundreds of Minutemen, who armed themselves and set out to oppose the British.

Revere arrived in Lexington shortly before Dawes, but together they warned Adams and Hancock and then set out for Concord. Along the way, they were joined by Samuel Prescott, a young Patriot who had been riding home after visiting a lady friend. Early on the morning of April 19, a British patrol captured Revere, and Dawes lost his horse, forcing him to walk back to Lexington on foot. However, Prescott escaped and rode on to Concord to warn the Patriots there. After being roughly questioned for an hour or two, Revere was released when the patrol heard Minutemen alarm guns being fired on their approach to Lexington.

About 5 a.m. on April 19, 700 British troops under Major John Pitcairn arrived at the town to find a 77-man-strong colonial militia under Captain John Parker waiting for them on Lexington's common green. Pitcairn ordered the outnumbered Patriots to disperse, and after a moment's hesitation, the Americans began to drift off the green. Suddenly, the " shot heard around the world" was fired from an undetermined gun, and a cloud of musket smoke soon covered the green. When the brief Battle of Lexington ended, a handful of Americans lay dead and several others wounded. The American Revolution had begun.

HISTORY Vault: The American Revolution

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On April 18, 1775, British troops march out of Boston on a mission to confiscate the American arsenal at Concord and to capture Patriot leaders Samuel Adams and John Hancock, known to be hiding at Lexington. As the British departed, Boston Patriots Paul Revere and William Dawes set out on horseback from the city to [...]

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This is one of the events leading up to the Revolution.

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The Townshend Acts were four laws passed by the British Parliament in 1767 imposing and enforcing the collection of taxes on the American colonies. Having no representation in Parliament, the American colonists saw the acts as an abuse of power. When the colonists resisted, Britain sent troops to collect the taxes, further heightening the tensions that led to the American Revolutionary War.

Key Takeaways: the Townshend Acts

The Townshend Acts

To help pay its massive debts from the Seven Years' War (1756-1763), the British Parliament-at the advice of Charles Townshend, the Chancellor of the British Exchequer-voted to levy new taxes on the American colonies. Known as the French and Indian War in the United States, the Seven Years' War had involved virtually every great power of Europe and spanned the entire globe. While it ended French influence in North America east of the Mississippi River, the war also left the British monarchy facing massive debt. Since parts of the war had been fought in North America and British forces had protected the American Colonies from attack, the British Crown expected the colonists to pay a share of the debt. Britain also needed additional revenue to fund the administration of its growing efforts toward global imperialism. Before the French and Indian War, the British government had been hesitant to tax its American Colonies.

Taxing the Colonies

The first direct British tax on the American Colonies for the sole purpose of raising revenue was the Sugar Act of 1764. It was also the first time that American colonists had spoken out against the issue of taxation without representation. Just a year later, the issue would become a major point of contention with the passage of the widely unpopular Stamp Act of 1765. While the Stamp Act was repealed in 1766, it was replaced by the Declaratory Act which proclaimed that Parliament's power over the Colonies was absolute. Early American patriots like Samuel Adams and Patrick Henry spoke out against the act believing that it violated the principles of the Magna Carta. Hoping to avoid revolution, American political leaders never asked for the repeal of the Declaratory Act.

Under the power of the Declaratory Act, the British government passed a series of policies in 1767 designed to raise revenue and enforce the Crown's authority over the American Colonies. This series of legislative acts became known as the Townshend Acts.

The four Townshend Acts of 1767 were intended to replace taxes lost due to the repeal of the highly unpopular Stamp Act of 1765.

The Suspending Act (New York Restraining Act), passed on June 5, 1767, banned the New York Colony Assembly from conducting business until it agreed to pay for the housing, meals, and other expenses of British troops stationed there under the Quartering Act of 1765.

The Revenue Act passed on June 26, 1767, required the payment of duties to the British government at colonial ports on tea, wine, lead, glass, paper, and paint imported into the colonies. Since Britain held a monopoly on these products, the colonies could not legally buy them from any other country.

The Indemnity Act passed on June 29, 1767, reduced duties on tea imported into England by the failing British East India Company, one of England's largest companies, and paid the company a refund on the duties on tea that was then exported from England to the colonies. The act was intended to save the British East India Company by helping it compete with tea smuggled into the colonies by Holland.

The Commissioners of Customs Act passed on June 29, 1767, established an American Customs Board. Headquartered in Boston, the five British-appointed commissioners of the Customs Board enforced a strict and often arbitrarily applied set of shipping and trade regulations, all intended to increase taxes paid to Britain. When the often heavy-handed tactics of the Customs Board spurred incidents between tax collectors and colonists, British troops were sent to occupy Boston, eventually leading to the Boston Massacre on March 5, 1770.

Clearly, the purpose of the Townshend Acts was to increase Britain's tax revenue and save the British East India Company, its most valuable economic asset. To that end, the acts had their greatest impact in 1768, when combined taxes collected from the colonies totaled £13,202 (British pounds)-the inflation-adjusted equivalent of about £2,177,200, or about $2,649,980 (U.S. dollars) in 2019.

Colonial Response

While the American colonists objected to the Townshend Acts taxes because they had not been represented in Parliament, the British government replied that they had "virtual representation," a claim which further outraged the colonists. The issue of "taxation without representation" had contributed to the repeal of the unpopular and unsuccessful Stamp Act in 1766. Repealing the Stamp Act spurred passage of the Declaratory Act, which proclaimed that the British Parliament could impose new laws on the colonies "in all cases whatsoever."

The most influential colonial objection to the Townshend Acts came in twelve essays by John Dickinson entitled " Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania." Published starting in December 1767, Dickinson's essays urged colonists to resist paying the British taxes. Moved by the essays, James Otis of Massachusetts rallied the Massachusetts House of Representatives, along with other colonial assemblies, to send petitions to King George III demanding repeal of the Revenue Act. In Britain, Colonial Secretary Lord Hillsborough threatened to dissolve the colonial assemblies if they supported the Massachusetts petition. When the Massachusetts House voted 92 to 17 not to rescind its petition, Massachusetts' British-appointed governor immediately disbanded the legislature. Parliament ignored the petitions.

Historical Significance

On March 5, 1770-ironically the same day as the Boston Massacre, though Britain would not learn of the incident for weeks-new British Prime Minister Lord North asked the House of Commons to repeal most of Townshend Revenue Act while retaining the lucrative tax on imported tea. Though controversial, the partial repeal of the Revenue Act was approved by King George on April 12, 1770.

Historian Robert Chaffin argues that partial repeal of the Revenue Act had little effect on the colonists' desire for independence. "The revenue-producing tea levy, the American Board of Customs and, most important, the principle of making governors and magistrates independent all remained. In fact, the modification of the Townshend Duties Act was scarcely any change at all," he wrote.

The Townshend Acts' despised tax on tea was retained in 1773 with Parliament's passage of the Tea Act. The act made the British East India Company the only source of tea in colonial America.

On December 16, 1773, the colonists' outrage over the Tax Act boiled over when members of the Sons of Liberty undertook the Boston Tea Party, setting the stage for the Declaration of Independence and the American Revolution.

Sources and Further Reference

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How the Townshend Acts Led to the American Revolution

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The British Townshend Acts imposed taxes that enraged American colonists and led to the American Revolution and Declaration of Independence.

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This is one of the events leading up to the Revolution.

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The Sugar Act of 1764 was a law enacted by the British Parliament intended to stop the smuggling of molasses into the American colonies from the West Indies by cutting taxes on molasses. The act also imposed new taxes on several other imported foreign goods while further restricting the export of certain highly demanded commodities such as lumber and iron that could legally be shipped from the colonies under the Navigation Acts. Proposed by British Prime Minister George Grenville, the Sugar Act amended the Molasses Act of 1733, which had actually reduced revenues by encouraging smuggling.

Key Takeaways: Sugar Act of 1764

Background

When Lord George Grenville took over as British prime minister in April 1763, Parliament found itself without the money it needed to protect the foreign colonies while repaying its massive debt from the recently concluded French and Indian Wars. Correctly sensing that the British people had reached their taxpaying limit, Grenville looked to the American colonies, which had so far paid relatively little in taxes but were promised full compensation for their contribution to the war effort. Citing these facts, Grenville convinced Parliament that the colonies should-for the first time in their history-contribute to the costs of supporting and defending them. Parliament responded by passing a series of colonial tax laws now known as the Revenue Acts, made up of the Sugar Act 1764, the Currency Act of 1764, the Stamp Act of 1765, the Townshend Acts of 1767, and the Tea Act of 1773.

The Sugar Act of 1764 amended the existing Molasses Act of 1733, which had imposed a hefty duty of six pence (about $.07 USD) per gallon on molasses-the key ingredient of rum-imported into the colonies from the non-British West Indies. However, instead of generating revenue, the duty resulted in most molasses shipments being smuggled into the colonies. The Sugar Act of 1764 reduced the duties on molasses and refined sugar to three pence, and it also empowered customs officers to act more aggressively in collecting duties and employ privately owned warships to intercept and seize ships suspected of smuggling.

Rewarded with a share of the profits from the sale of the seized ships and cargo, the "privateer" captains and crews of these warships were encouraged to attack and detain ships at random. This virtual form of government-endorsed piracy and sudden, often overly zealous enforcement of duty collection policy, angered American merchants both in the colonies and in England, many of whom had become wealthy from smuggling.

Impact on the Colonies

The Sugar Act also imposed new taxes on other imported products, such as wine, coffee, and fabric, and strictly regulated the export of lumber and iron, then the most demanded commodities produced in the colonies. The tax on sugar and molasses, coupled with Britain's drastic anti-smuggling enforcement methods, greatly harmed the emerging colonial rum industry by giving British West Indies sugarcane planters and rum distillers a virtual monopoly.

The combined effects of the Sugar Act also greatly reduced the colonies' ability to trade with Portugal, the Azores, the Canary Islands, and the French West Indies, their main customers of lumber, iron, flour, cheese, and farm produce. By reducing the markets to which the colonies could sell while restricting their access to money needed to buy goods manufactured in Britain, the Sugar Act, along with the other associated Revenue Acts, greatly limited the colonial economy.

Among all the regions of the colonies, the New England seaports were especially hurt by the Sugar Act. Smuggling became so dangerous that their dwindling profits from rum no longer covered the taxes on molasses. Forced to charge more for their rum, many colonial merchants were priced out of the market by the British West Indies, which now controlled the market. Profiting from reduced expenses thanks to their vast supplies of molasses, the islands of the British West Indies prospered at the expense of the New England seaports.

While American colonial leaders were all too aware that Britain's imposition of the various Revenue Acts represented unfair taxation without representation, it was their economic impact, rather than their constitutional issues, that served as the main focus of the colonists' protests.

Opposition to the Act

While all but the staunchest British loyalists among the American colonists objected to the Sugar Act, the formal protest against it was led by former British tax collector Samuel Adams and provincial legislative member James Otis, both of Massachusetts.

In a paper presented to the Massachusetts assembly in May 1764, Adams denounced the Sugar Act as a denial of the colonists' rights as British subjects that reduced them to the status of slaves.

"For if our Trade may be taxed why not our Lands? Why not the Produce of our Lands and everything we possess or make use of? This we apprehend annihilates our Charter Right to govern & tax ourselves. It strikes our British Privileges, which as we have never forfeited them, we hold in common with our Fellow Subjects who are Natives of Britain. If Taxes are laid upon us in any shape without our having a legal Representation where they are laid, are we not reduced from the Character of free Subjects to the miserable State of tributary Slaves?"

In his own report on the Sugar Act, James Otis struck at the heart of the issue of the colonists-still British subjects-being taxed without a voice in Parliament. "Can it be possible that the duties to be imposed and the taxes to be levied, shall be assessed without the voice or consent of a single American in Parliament?" Otis asked, adding, "If we are not represented, we are slaves."

In these words, Otis had offered the doctrine from which the colonists would draw inspiration over the next decade of protest and resistance that led to the American Revolution. Indeed, Otis has been credited with coining the American Patriot's famous rallying cry of "Taxation without representation is tyranny."

Connection to the Revolution

In August 1764, just three months after Samuel Adams and James Otis had published their scathing reports listing the ills of the Sugar Act, several Boston merchants agreed to stop buying non-essential luxury products from Britain. At this time, however, protest to the Sugar Act by the general public had remained limited. That would change drastically a year later, when the British Parliament passed the Stamp Act of 1765.

The Stamp Act imposed a direct tax on the colonists by requiring that virtually all printed materials produced in the colonies, such as court papers, newspapers, pamphlets, almanacs, even playing cards and dice, be printed only on paper made in London and bearing an embossed British revenue stamp.

While the effects of the Sugar Act had been felt mainly in New England, the Stamp Act attacked the pockets of nearly every adult in all 13 colonies. Formed in the summer of 1765, the Sons of Liberty burned the stamps and raided the homes and warehouses of wealthy British stamp distributors and tax collectors. Amid the torrent of protests, riots, and stamp burnings that followed, colonists effectively nullified the Stamp Act.

These struggles against "taxation without representation" stirred the colonial passions that led to the firing of the "shot heard round the world" in the Battles of Lexington and Concord that marked start of the American Revolution on April 19, 1765.

Sources and Further Reference

"The Sugar Act: Titled The American Revenue Act 1764." Independence Hall Association, https://www.ushistory.org/declaration/related/sugaract.html.

"British Control and Colonial Resistance, 1763 to 1766." U.S. Library of Congress, http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/presentationsandactivities/presentations/timeline/amrev/britref/.

"Parliamentary taxation of colonies, international trade, and the American Revolution, 1763-1775." U.S. Department of State, Office of the Historian, https://history.state.gov/milestones/1750-1775/parliamentary-taxation.

Draper, Theodore. "A Struggle For Power: The American Revolution." Vintage (March 15,1997), ISBN 0-8129-2575-0

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What Was the Sugar Act? Definition and History

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The Sugar Act of 1764 was a law enacted by the British Parliament intended to stop the smuggling of molasses into the American colonies from the West Indies by cutting taxes on molasses.

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The Quartering Act:  British Laws Opposed by the Colonists

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The Quartering Act:  British Laws Opposed by the Colonists

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This is of the events leading up to the Revolution.

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The Quartering Act was the name given to a series of British laws of the 1760s and 1770s which required that American colonies provide housing for British soldiers stationed in the colonies. The laws were deeply resented by colonists, created a number of disputes in colonial legislatures, and were noteworthy enough to be referred to in the Declaration of Independence.

The Third Amendment to the U.S Constitution is essentially a reference to the Quartering Act, and states explicitly that no soldiers will be lodged in "any house" in the new nation. While the language in the Constitution seems to refer to private houses, there had not been quartering of British soldiers in the private homes of colonists. In practice, the various versions of the Quartering Act generally required the housing of British troops in barracks or in public houses and inns.

Key Takeaways: The Quartering Act

History of the Quartering Acts

The first Quartering Act was passed by Parliament in March 1765 and was intended to last for two years. The law came about because the commander of British troops in the colonies, General Thomas Gage, sought clarity on how troops kept in America were to be housed. During wartime, troops were housed in a fairly improvisational way, but if they were to stay in America on a permanent basis some provisions had to be made.

Under the act, the colonies were required to provide housing and supplies for soldiers in the British Army stationed in America. The new law did not provide for housing soldiers in private residences. However, as the law required that colonists pay to buy suitable vacant buildings as housing for soldiers, it was disliked and widely resented as unjust taxation.

The law left many of the details of how it was implemented up to the colonial assemblies (the precursor of state legislatures), so it was fairly easily to circumvent. The assemblies could simply refuse to approve the necessary funds and the law was effectively stymied.

When the New York assembly did that in December 1766, the British Parliament retaliated by passing what was called the Restraining Act, which would suspend New York's legislature until it followed the Quartering Act. A compromise was worked out before the situation became more serious, but the incident demonstrated the controversial nature of the Quartering Act and the importance in which Britain held it.

A second Quartering Act, which provided for soldiers to be housed in public houses, was passed in 1766.

The quartering of troops among, or even near, the civilian population could lead to tensions. British troops in Boston in February 1770, when faced with a mob throwing rocks and snowballs, fired into a crowd in what became known as the Boston Massacre.

The third Quartering Act was passed by Parliament on June 2, 1774, as part of the Intolerable Acts intended to punish Boston for the Tea Party the previous year. The third act required that housing be provided by the colonists at the location of the troop's assignment. Furthermore, the new version of the act was more expansive, and gave British officials in the colonies power to seize unoccupied buildings to house soldiers.

Reaction to the Quartering Act

The 1774 Quartering Act was disliked by the colonists, as it was clearly an infringement upon local authority. Yet opposition to the Quartering Act was mainly a part of opposition to the Intolerable Acts. The Quartering Act on its own did not provoke any substantial acts of resistance.

Still, the Quartering Act did receive mention in the Declaration of Independence. Among the list of "repeated injuries and usurpations" attributed to the King was "For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us." Also mentioned was the standing army which the Quartering Act represented: "He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures."

The Third Amendment

The inclusion of a separate amendment within the Bill of Rights referring to the quartering of troops reflected conventional American thinking at the time. The leaders of the new country were suspicious of standing armies, and concerns about quartering troops were serious enough to warrant a Constitutional reference to it.

The Third Amendment reads:

No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

While quartering troops deserved mention in 1789, the Third Amendment is the least litigated part of the Constitution. As the quartering of troops simply hasn't been an issue, the Supreme Court has never decided a case based on the Third Amendment.

Parkinson, Robert G. "Quartering Act." Encyclopedia of the New American Nation, edited by Paul Finkelman, vol. 3, Charles Scribner's Sons, 2006, p. 65. Gale Virtual Reference Library.

Selesky, Harold E. "Quartering Acts." Encyclopedia of the American Revolution: Library of Military History, edited by Harold E. Selesky, vol. 2, Charles Scribner's Sons, 2006, pp. 955-956. Gale Virtual Reference Library.

"The Intolerable Acts." American Revolution Reference Library, edited by Barbara Bigelow, et al., vol. 4: Primary Sources, UXL, 2000, pp. 37-43. Gale Virtual Reference Library.

"Third Amendment." Constitutional Amendments: From Freedom of Speech to Flag Burning, 2nd ed., vol. 1, UXL, 2008. Gale Virtual Reference Library.

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Quartering Act, British Laws Resented by American Colonists

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The Quartering Act was a series of 3 controversial laws prescribing how American colonists must provide housing for British troops stationed in the colonies.

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The Culper Ring: George Washington's Secret Spies

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The Culper Ring: George Washington's Secret Spies

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Learn about the first spied in America.

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How Civilian Agents Changed the American Revolution

In July 1776, colonial delegates wrote and signed the Declaration of Independence, effectively announcing that they intended to separate from the British Empire, and soon, war was underway. However, by the end of the year, things weren't looking so good for General George Washington and the Continental Army. He and his troops had been forced to abandon their position in New York City and flee across New Jersey. To make matters worse, the spy Washington sent to gather intelligence, Nathan Hale, had been captured by the British and hanged for treason.

Washington was in a tough spot, and had no way to learn about his enemies' movements. Over the next few months, he organized several different groups to collect information, operating under the theory that civilians would attract less attention than military personnel, but by 1778, he still lacked a network of agents in New York.

The Culper Ring was thus formed out of sheer necessity. Washington's director of military intelligence, Benjamin Tallmadge-who had been Nathan Hale's roommate at Yale-managed to recruit a small group of friends from his hometown; each of them brought other sources of information into the spy network. Working together, they organized a complex system of gathering and relaying intelligence to Washington, risking their own lives in the process.

Key Members of the Culper Ring

Benjamin Tallmadge was a dashing young major in Washington's army, and his director of military intelligence. Originally from Setauket, on Long Island, Tallmadge initiated a series of correspondences with friends in his hometown, who formed the key members of the ring. By sending his civilian agents out on reconnaissance missions, and creating an elaborate method of passing information back to Washington's camp in secret, Tallmadge was effectively America's first spymaster.

Farmer Abraham Woodhull made regular trips into Manhattan to deliver goods, and stayed at a boarding house run by his sister Mary Underhill and her husband Amos. The boarding house was a residence for a number of British officers, so Woodhull and the Underhills obtained significant information about troop movements and supply chains.

Robert Townsend was both a journalist and merchant, and owned a coffeehouse that was popular with British soldiers, placing him in a perfect position to gather intelligence. Townsend was one of the last of the Culper members to be identified by modern researchers. In 1929, historian Morton Pennypacker made the connection by matching handwriting on some of Townsend's letters to those sent to Washington by the spy known only as "Culper Junior."

The descendant of one of the original Mayflower passengers, Caleb Brewster worked as a courier for the Culper Ring. A skilled boat captain, he navigated through hard-to-reach coves and channels to pick up information gathered by the other members, and deliver it to Tallmadge. During the war, Brewster also ran smuggling missions from a whaling ship.

Austin Roe worked as a merchant during the Revolution, and served as a courier for the ring. Riding on horseback, he regularly made the 55-mile trip between Setauket and Manhattan. In 2015, a letter was discovered that revealed Roe's brothers Phillips and Nathaniel were also involved in espionage.

Agent 355 was the only known female member of the original spy network, and historians have been unable to confirm who she was. It is possible that she was Anna Strong, a neighbor of Woodhull's, who sent signals to Brewster via her laundry line. Strong was the wife of Selah Strong, a judge who had been arrested in 1778 on suspicion of seditious activity. Selah was confined on a British prison ship in New York harbor for " surreptitious correspondence with the enemy. "

It is more likely that Agent 355 was not Anna Strong, but a woman of some social prominence living in New York, possibly even a member of a Loyalist family. Correspondence indicates that she had regular contact with Major John Andre, the chief of British intelligence, and Benedict Arnold, both of whom were stationed in the city.

In addition to these primary members of the ring, there was an extensive network of other civilians relaying messages regularly, including tailor Hercules Mulligan, journalist James Rivington, and a number of relatives of Woodhull and Tallmadge.

Codes, Invisible Ink, Pseudonyms, and a Clothesline

Tallmadge created several complex methods of writing coded messages, so that if any correspondence was intercepted, there would be no hint of espionage. One system he employed was that of using numbers instead of common words, names, and places. He provided a key to Washington, Woodhull, and Townsend, so that messages could be written and translated quickly.

Washington provided members of the ring with invisible ink, as well, which was cutting edge technology at the time. Although it isn't known how many messages were sent employing this method, there must have been a significant number; in 1779 Washington wrote to Tallmadge that he had run out of the ink, and would attempt to procure more.

Tallmadge also insisted that members of the ring use pseudonyms. Woodhull was known as Samuel Culper; his name was devised by Washington as a play on Culpeper County, Virginia. Tallmadge himself went by the alias John Bolton, and Townsend was Culper Junior. Secrecy was so important that Washington himself did not know the true identities of some of his agents. Washington was referred to simply as 711.

The delivery process for intelligence was fairly complex as well. According to historians at Washington's Mount Vernon, Austin Roe rode into New York from Setauket. When he got there, he visited Townsend's shop and dropped off a note signed by John Bolton-Tallmadge's code name. Coded messages were cached away in trade goods from Townsend, and transported by Roe back to Setauket. These intelligence dispatches were then hidden

"... on a farm belonging to Abraham Woodhull, who would later retrieve the messages. Anna Strong, who owned a farm near to Woodhull's barn, would then hang a black petticoat on her clothesline that Caleb Brewster could see in order to signal him to retrieve the documents. Strong indicated which cove Brewster should land at by hanging up handkerchiefs to designate the specific cove."

Once Brewster collected the messages, he delivered them to Tallmadge, in Washington's camp.

Successful Interventions

Culper agents learned in 1780 that British troops, commanded by General Henry Clinton, were about to advance into Rhode Island. Had they arrived as planned, they would have caused considerable problems for the Marquis de Lafayette and Comte de Rochambeau, Washington's French allies, who intended to land with 6,000 troops of their own near Newport.

Tallmadge passed the information along to Washington, who then moved his own troops into place. Once Clinton learned of the Continental Army's offensive position, he cancelled the attack and stayed out of Rhode Island.

In addition, they discovered a plan by the British to create counterfeit Continental money. The intention was for the currency to be printed on the same paper as American money and to undermine the war efforts, the economy, and trust in the acting government. Stuart Hatfield at Journal of the American Revolution says,

"Perhaps if people lost faith in the Congress, they would realize that war could not be won, and they would all return to the fold."

Perhaps even more importantly, the members of group are believed to have been instrumental in the exposure of Benedict Arnold, who had been conspiring with Major John Andre. Arnold, a general in the Continental Army, planned to turn over the American fort at West Point to Andre and the British, and eventually defected to their side. Andre was captured and hanged for his role as a British spy.

After the War

Following the end of the American Revolution, the members of the Culper Ring returned to normal lives. Benjamin Tallmadge and his wife, Mary Floyd, moved to Connecticut with their seven children; Tallmadge became a successful banker, land investor, and postmaster. In 1800, he was elected to Congress, and remained there for seventeen years.

Abraham Woodhull remained on his farm in Setauket. In 1781, he married his second wife, Mary Smith, and they had three children. Woodhull became a magistrate, and in his later years was the first judge in Suffolk County.

Anna Strong, who may or may not have been Agent 355, but certainly was involved in the ring's clandestine activities, was reunited with her husband Selah after the war. With their nine children, they stayed in Setauket. Anna died in 1812, and Selah three years later.

After the war, Caleb Brewster worked as a blacksmith, a cutter captain, and for the last two decades of his life, a farmer. He married Anna Lewis of Fairfield, Connecticut, and had eight children. Brewster served as an officer in the Revenue Cutter Service, which was the predecessor of today's US Coast Guard. During the War of 1812, his cutter Active provided " the best maritime intelligence to authorities in New York and to Commodore Stephen Decatur, whose warships were trapped by the Royal Navy up the Thames River." Brewster remained in Fairfield until his death in 1827.

Austin Roe, the merchant and tavern keeper who regularly rode a 110-mile round trip to deliver information, continued to operate Roe's Tavern in East Setauket after the war. He died in 1830.

Robert Townsend moved back to his home in Oyster Bay, New York, after the Revolution ended. He never married, and lived quietly with his sister until his death in 1838. His involvement in the Culper ring was a secret he took to his grave; Townsend's identity was never discovered until historian Morton Pennypacker made the connection in 1930.

These six individuals, along with their network of family members, friends, and business associates, managed to leverage a complex system of intelligence methods during America's early years. Together, they changed the course of history.

Key Takeaways

A group of civilian spies recruited during the American Revolution gathered intelligence which was then passed along to George Washington.

Members of the group used a numbered code book, false names, invisible ink, and a complex delivery method to get information back to Washington's staff.

Culper agents prevented an attack on Rhode Island, uncovered a plot to counterfeit Continental money, and were instrumental in the exposure of Benedict Arnold.

Selected Sources

"The Culper Code Book," George Washington's Mount Vernon, retrieved March 17, 2018.

"Culper Spy Ring," George Washington's Mount Vernon, retrieved March 17, 2018.

George Washington's Secret Six: The Spy Ring That Saved the American Revolution, by Brian Kilmeade and Don Yeager. Sentinel Press, 2016.

"Faking It: British Counterfeiting During the American Revolution," byStuart Hatfield, Journal of the American Revolution, retrieved March 16, 2018.

"Memoir of Col. Benjamin Tallmadge," from the Library of Congress Collection at Archive.org, retrieved March 17, 2018.

Washington's Spies: The Story of America's First Spy Ring, by Alexander Rose.

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The Culper Ring: George Washington's Secret Spies

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How Civilian Agents Changed the American Revolution In July 1776, colonial delegates wrote and signed the Declaration of Independence, effectively announcing that they intended to separate from the British Empire, and soon, war was underway. However, by the end of the year, things weren't looking so good for General George Washington and the Continental Army.

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Deborah Sampson: Revolutionary War Heroine

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Deborah Sampson: Revolutionary War Heroine

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Learn what one of several women did during the Revolutionary War.

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Deborah Sampson Gannett (December 17, 1760-April 29, 1827) was one of the only women to serve in the army during the Revolutionary War. After disguising herself as a man and enlisting under the name Robert Shurtliff, she served for 18 months. Sampson was severely wounded in battle and received an honorable discharge after her gender was discovered. She later successfully fought for her rights to a military pension.

Fast Facts: Deborah Sampson

Deborah Sampson's parents were descended from Mayflower passengers and Puritan luminaries, but they did not prosper like many of their ancestors. When Deborah was about five years old, her father vanished. The family believed that he was lost at sea during a fishing trip, but it later emerged that he had abandoned his wife and six young children to build a new life and family in Maine.

Deborah's mother, unable to provide for her children, placed them with other relatives and families, as was common for destitute parents of the time. Deborah ended up with the widow of a former minister, Mary Prince Thatcher, who likely taught the child to read. From that point on, Deborah displayed a desire for education unusual in a girl of that era.

When Mrs. Thatcher died around 1770, 10-year-old Deborah became an indentured servant in the household of Jeremiah Thomas of Middleborough, Massachusetts. "Mr. Thomas, as an earnest patriot, did much towards shaping the political opinions of the young woman in his charge." At the same time, Thomas did not believe in women's education, so Deborah borrowed books from the Thomas sons.

After her indenture ended in 1778, Deborah supported herself by teaching school in the summers and working as a weaver in the winter. She also used her skills at light woodworking to peddle goods like spools, pie crimpers, milking stools, and other items door-to-door.

Enlisting in the Army

The Revolution was in its final months when Deborah decided to disguise herself and attempt to enlist sometime in late 1781. She purchased some cloth and made herself a suit of men's clothing. At 22, Deborah had reached a height of around five feet, eight inches, tall even for men of the period. With a wide waist and a small chest, it was easy enough for her to pass as a young man.

She first enlisted under the pseudonym "Timothy Thayer" in Middleborough in early 1782, but her identity was discovered before she made it into service. On Sept. 3, 1782, the First Baptist Church of Middleborough expelled her, writing that she: "Last spring was accused of dressing in men's clothes and enlisting as a Soldier in the Army [...] and for some time before had behaved very loose and unchristian like, and at last left our parts in a suden maner, and it is not known where she has gone."

She ended up walking from Middleborough to the port of New Bedford, where she considered signing on to an American cruiser, then passed through Boston and its suburbs, where she finally mustered in as "Robert Shurtliff" in Uxbridge in May 1782. Private Shurtliff was one of 50 new members of the Light Infantry Company of the 4th Massachusetts Infantry.

Identity Uncovered

Deborah soon saw combat. On July 3, 1782, just a few weeks into her service, she took part in a battle outside Tarrytown, New York. During the fight, she was struck by two musket balls in the leg and a gash to her forehead. Fearing exposure, "Shurtliff" begged comrades to leave her to die in the field, but they took her to the surgeon anyway. She quickly slipped out of the field hospital and removed the bullets with a penknife.

More or less permanently disabled, Private Shurtliff was reassigned as a waiter to General John Patterson. The war was essentially over, but American troops remained in the field. By June 1783, Deborah's unit was sent to Philadelphia to put down a brewing mutiny among American soldiers over delays in back pay and discharge.

Fevers and illness were common in Philadelphia, and not long after she arrived, Deborah fell seriously ill. She was put under the care of Dr. Barnabas Binney, who discovered her true gender as she lay delirious in his hospital. Rather than alert her commander, he took her to his home and put her under the care of his wife and daughters.

After months in Binney's care, it was time for her to rejoin General Patterson. As she prepared to leave, Binney gave her a note to give to the General, which she correctly assumed revealed her gender. Following her return, she was called to Patterson's quarters. "She says, 'A re-entrance was harder than facing a cannonade," in her biography. She nearly fainted from the tension.

To her surprise, Patterson decided not to punish her. He and his staff seemed almost impressed she had carried off her ruse for so long. With no sign she had ever acted inappropriately with her male comrades, Private Shurtliff was given an honorable discharge on Oct. 25, 1783.

Becoming Mrs. Gannett

Deborah returned to Massachusetts, where she married Benjamin Gannett and settled down on their small farm in Sharon. She was soon the mother of four: Earl, Mary, Patience, and an adopted daughter named Susanna. Like many families in the young Republic, the Gannetts struggled financially.

Starting in 1792, Deborah began what would become a decades-long battle to receive back pay and pension relief from her time in service. Unlike many of her male peers, Deborah didn't rely just on petitions and letters to Congress. To raise her profile and strengthen her case, she also allowed a local writer named Herman Mann to write a romanticized version of her life story, and in 1802 embarked on a lengthy lecture tour of Massachusetts and New York.

National Tour

Reluctantly leaving her children in Sharon, Gannett was on the road from June 1802 to April 1803. Her tour covered over 1,000 miles and stopped in every major town in Massachusetts and the Hudson River Valley, ending in New York City. In most towns, she lectured simply on her wartime experiences.

In bigger venues like Boston, the "American Heroine" was a spectacle. Gannett would give her lecture in female dress, then exit the stage as a chorus sang patriotic tunes. Finally, she would reappear in her military uniform and perform a complex, 27-step military drill with her musket.

Her tour was met with widespread acclaim until she got to New York City, where she lasted only a single performance. "Her talents do not appear calculated for theatrical exhibitions," one reviewer sniffed. She returned home to Sharon soon after. Because of the high cost of travel, she ended up making a profit of around $110.

Petition for Benefits

In her long fight for benefits, Gannett had the support of some powerful allies like Revolutionary War hero Paul Revere, Massachusetts Congressman William Eustis, and her old commander, General Patterson. All would press her claims with the Government, and Revere, in particular, would frequently lend her money. Revere wrote to Eustis after meeting Gannett in 1804, describing her as "much out of health," in part because of her military service, and despite the Gannett's obvious efforts, "they are really poor." He added:

We commonly form our Idea of the person whom we hear spoken off, whom we have never seen; according as their actions are described, when I heard her spoken off as a Soldier, I formed the Idea of a tall, Masculine female, who had a small share of understandg, without education, & one of the meanest of her Sex-When I saw and discoursed with I was agreeably surprised to find a small, effeminate, and converseable Woman, whose education entitled her to a better situation in life.

In 1792, Gannett successfully petitioned the Massachusetts Legislature for back pay of £34, plus interest. Following her lecture tour in 1803, she began to petition the Congress for disability pay. In 1805, she received a lump sum of $104 plus $48 a year thereafter. In 1818, she gave up disability pay for a general pension of $96 a year. The fight for retroactive payments went on until the end of her life.

Deborah died at the age of 68, after a long period of ill health. The family was too poor to pay for a headstone, so her gravesite in Sharon's Rock Ridge Cemetery was unmarked until the 1850s or 1860s. At first, she was noted only as "Deborah, Wife of Benjamin Gannett." It wasn't until years after that someone memorialized her service by carving into the headstone, "Deborah Sampson Gannett/Robert Shurtliff/The Female Soldier."

Resources and Further Reading

Abbatt, William. The Magazine of History with Notes and Queries: Extra Numbers. 45-48, XII, 1916.

"Letter from Paul Revere to William Eustis, 20 February 1804." Massachusetts Historical Society Collections Online, Mass Cultural Council, 2019.

Mann, Herman. Female Review: Life of Deborah Sampson, the Female Soldier in the War of the Revolution. Forgotten, 2016.

Rothman, Ellen K., et al. "Deborah Sampson Performs in Boston." Mass Moments, Mass Humanities.

Young, Alfred Fabian. Masquerade: The Life and Times of Deborah Sampson, Continental Soldier. Vintage, 2005.

Weston, Thomas. History of the Town of Middleboro, Massachusetts. Vol. 1, Houghton Mifflin, 1906.

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Deborah Sampson: Hidden Heroine of the American Revolution

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Deborah Sampson Gannett, one of the only women to serve in the Revolutionary War, disguised herself as a man in order to enlist in the army.

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The Role of France in the American Revolution

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The Role of France in the American Revolution

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Why was France involved in the Revolution? Who did they help? How?

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After years of spiraling tensions in Britain's American colonies, the American Revolutionary War began in 1775. The revolutionary colonists faced a war against one of the world's major powers, one with an empire that spanned the globe. To help counter this, the Continental Congress created the 'Secret Committee of Correspondence' to publicise the aims and actions of the rebels in Europe, before drafting the 'Model Treaty' to guide negotiations of alliance with foreign powers. Once the Congress had declared independence in 1776, they sent a party including Benjamin Franklin to negotiate with Britain's rival: France.

France initially sent agents to observe the war, organized secret supplies, and began preparations for war against Britain in support of the rebels. France might seem an odd choice for the revolutionaries to deal with. The nation was ruled by an absolutist monarch who was not sympathetic to claims of ' no taxation without representation', even if the plight of the colonists and their perceived fight against a domineering empire excited idealistic Frenchmen like the Marquis de Lafayette. France was also Catholic, and the colonies were Protestant, something which was a major issue at the time and had colored several centuries of foreign relations.

But French was a colonial rival of Britain, and while arguably Europe's most prestigious nation, France had suffered humiliating defeats to the British in the Seven Years War - especially its American theatre, the French-Indian War - only years earlier. France was looking for any way to boost its own reputation while undermining Britain's, and helping the colonists to independence looked like a perfect way of doing this. The fact that some of the revolutionaries had fought France in the French- Indian war scant years earlier was expediently overlooked. In fact, the French Duc de Choiseul had outlined how France would restore their prestige from the Seven Years War as early as 1765 by saying the colonists would soon throw the British out, and then France and Spain had to unite and fight Britain for naval dominance.

Franklin's actions helped prompt a wave of sympathy across France for the revolutionary cause, and a fashion for all things American took hold. Franklin used this to help in negotiations with French Foreign Minister Vergennes, who was initially keen on a full alliance, especially after the British were forced to abandon their base in Boston. Then news arrived of defeats suffered by Washington and his Continental Army in New York. With Britain seemingly on the rise, Vergennes wavered, hesitating over a full alliance and afraid of pushing the colonies back to Britain, but he sent a secret loan and other aid anyway. Meanwhile, the French entered negotiations with the Spanish, who could also threaten Britain, but who were worried about colonial independence.

In December 1777 news reached France of the British surrender at Saratoga, a victory which convinced the French to make a full alliance with the revolutionaries and to enter the war with troops. On February 6th, 1778 Franklin and two other American commissioners signed the Treaty of Alliance and a Treaty of Amity and Commerce with France. This contained a clause banning either Congress or France making a separate peace with Britain and a commitment to keep fighting until US independence was recognized. Spain entered the war on the revolutionary side later that year.

Intriguingly, the French Foreign Office attempted to pin down "legitimate" reasons for France's entry into the war and found almost none. France couldn't argue for the rights which the Americans claimed without damaging their own political position, and couldn't claim to be a mediator between Britain and America after their own behavior. Indeed, all the report could recommend was stressing disputes with Britain and avoiding discussion in favor of simply acting. (Mackesy, The War for America, p.161). But 'legitimate' reasons weren't the order of the day and the French went anyway.

Now fully committed to the war, France supplied arms, munitions, supplies, and uniforms. French troops and naval power were also sent to America, reinforcing and protecting Washington's Continental Army. The decision to send troops was taken carefully, as few in France had any idea how US citizens would react to a foreign army, and the numbers of soldiers were carefully chosen to balance being effective, with not being large enough to anger Americans. The commanders were carefully selected, men who could work effectively with both themselves and US commanders; however, the leader of the French army, Count Rochambeau, didn't speak English. While the troops selected weren't, as once believed, the very cream of the French army, they were, as one historian has commented, for "1780...probably the most sophisticated military instrument ever dispatched to the New World." (Kennett, The French Forces in America, 1780 - 1783, p. 24)

There were problems in working together at first, as Sullivan found at Newport when French ships pulled away from a siege to deal with British ships, before being damaged and having to retreat. But overall the US and French forces co-operated well - although they were often kept separated - and certainly when compared to the incessant problems experienced in the British high command. French forces attempted to buy everything they couldn't ship in from locals rather than requisition it, and they spent an estimated $4 million worth of precious metal in doing so, further endearing themselves to locals.

Arguably the key French contribution came during the Yorktown campaign. French forces under Rochambeau landed at Rhode Island in 1780, which they fortified before linking up with Washington in 1781. Later that year the Franco-American army marched 700 miles south to besiege Cornwallis' British army at Yorktown while the French navy cut the British off from desperately needed naval supplies, reinforcements, and complete evacuation to New York. Cornwallis was forced to surrender to Washington and Rochambeau, and this proved the last major engagement of the war, as Britain opened peace discussions soon after rather than continue a global war.

America wasn't the only theatre in a war which, with France's entrance, had turned global. France was now able to threaten British shipping and territory around the globe, preventing their rival from focusing fully on the conflict in the Americas. Part of the impetus behind Britain's surrender after Yorktown was the need to hold the remainder of their colonial empire from attack by other European nations, such as France, and there were battles outside America in 1782 and 83 as peace negotiations took place. Many in Britain felt that France was their primary enemy, and should be the focus; some even suggested pulling out of the US colonies entirely to focus on their neighbor.

Despite British attempts to divide France and Congress during peace negotiations, the allies remained firm - aided by a further French loan - and peace was reached in the Treaty of Paris in 1783 between Britain, France, and the United States. Britain had to sign further treaties with other European powers who had become involved.

Britain would win several wars in which it started badly and had to regroup, but they quit the American Revolutionary War rather than fight another global war with France. This might seem like a triumph for the latter, but in truth, it was a disaster. The financial pressures France faced were only made worse by the cost of pushing the US into being and victory, and these finances would now spiral out of control and play a large role in the start of the French Revolution in 1789. France thought it was harming Britain by acting in the New World, but the consequences affected the whole of Europe just a few years later.

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The Role of France in the American Revolutionary War

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After years of spiraling tensions in Britain's American colonies, the American Revolutionary War began in 1775. The revolutionary colonists faced a war against one of the world's major powers, one with an empire that spanned the globe.

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The American Revolution began in 1775 and led to the rapid formation of American armies to oppose the British. While British forces were largely led by professional officers and filled with career soldiers, the American leadership and ranks were filled with individuals drawn from all walks of colonial life. Some American leaders, such as George Washington, possessed extensive service in the militia, while others came directly from civilian life. The American leadership was also supplemented by foreign officers recruited in Europe, though these were of varying quality. During the early years of the conflict, American forces were hampered by poor generals and those who had achieved their rank through political connections. As the war wore on, many of these were replaced as competent and skilled officers emerged.

American Revolution Leaders: American

Major General William Alexander, Lord Stirling - noted brigade, division, and department commander

Lieutenant Colonel Ethan Allen - Commander, Green Mountain Boys during 1775 attack on Fort Ticonderoga

Major General Benedict Arnold - noted field commander, famously changed sides in 1780 becoming one of history's best-known traitors

Commodore John Barry - noted naval commander

Brigadier General George Rogers Clark - Conqueror of the Old Northwest

Major General Horatio Gates - Commander, Northern Department, 1777-1778, Southern Department, 1780

Colonel Christopher Greene - Commander at Fort Mercer, Battle of Red Bank

Major General Nathanael Greene - Commander, Continental Army in the South (1780-1783)

Commodore John Paul Jones - Key American naval commander

Major General Henry Knox - American artillery commander

Marquis de Lafayette - Noted French volunteer in American service

Major General Charles Lee - Controversial American field commander

Major General Henry "Light Horse Harry" Lee - noted American cavalry/light infantry commander

Major General Benjamin Lincoln - Commander, Southern Department (1778-1780)

Brigadier General Francis Marion - "The Swamp Fox" - Noted guerilla leader

Brigadier General Hugh Mercer - American general killed in 1777

Major General Richard Montgomery - Promising American general killed at the Battle of Quebec

Brigadier General Daniel Morgan - Key commander at Saratoga and Cowpens

Major Samuel Nicholas - Founding Officer, US Marine Corps

Brigadier General Count Casimir Pulaski - Father of the America Cavalry

Major General Arthur St. Clair - Commander at Fort Ticonderoga, 1777

Major General John Stark - Victor of Bennington

Major General Baron Friedrich von Steuben - Inspector General, Continental Army

Major General John Sullivan - Division Commander (1776-1778), Commander, Rhode Island (1778), Sullivan Expedition (1779)

General George Washington - Commander in Chief, Continental Army

Major General Anthony Wayne - Daring American commander who saw extensive service

American Revolution Leaders - British

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Who Were the Leaders of the American Revolution?

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The American Revolution saw professional British officers clash with American leaders who were drawn from all walks of life or from overseas.

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The battles of the American Revolution were fought as far north as Quebec and as far south as Savannah. As the war became global with the entry of France in 1778, other battles were fought overseas as the powers of Europe clashed. Beginning in 1775, these battles brought to prominence previously quiet villages such as Lexington, Germantown, Saratoga, and Yorktown, forever linking their names with the cause of American independence. Fighting during the early years of the American Revolution was generally in the North, while the war shifted south after 1779. During the war, around 25,000 Americans died (approx. 8,000 in battle), while another 25,000 were wounded. British and German losses numbered around 20,000 and 7,500 respectively.

American Revolution Battles

1775

April 19 - Battles of Lexington & Concord - Massachusetts

April 19, 1775-March 17, 1776 - Siege of Boston - Massachusetts

May 10 - Capture of Fort Ticonderoga - New York

June 11-12 - Battle of Machias - Massachusetts (Maine)

June 17 - Battle of Bunker Hill - Massachusetts

September 17-November 3 - Siege of Fort St. Jean - Canada

September 19-November 9 - Arnold Expedition - Maine/Canada

December 9 - Battle of Great Bridge - Virginia

December 31 - Battle of Quebec - Canada

1776

February 27 - Battle of Moore's Creek Bridge - North Carolina

March 3-4 - Battle of Nassau - Bahamas

June 28 - Battle of Sullivan's Island (Charleston) - South Carolina

August 27-30 - Battle of Long Island - New York

September 16 - Battle of Harlem Heights - New York

October 11 - Battle of Valcour Island - New York

October 28 - Battle of White Plains - New York

November 16 - Battle of Fort Washington - New York

December 26 - Battle of Trenton - New Jersey

1777

January 2 - Battle of the Assunpink Creek - New Jersey

January 3 - Battle of Princeton - New Jersey

April 27 - Battle of Ridgefield - Connecticut

June 26 - Battle of Short Hills - New Jersey

July 2-6 - Siege of Fort Ticonderoga - New York

July 7 - Battle of Hubbardton - Vermont

August 2-22 - Siege of Fort Stanwix - New York

August 6 - Battle of Oriskany - New York

August 16 - Battle of Bennington - New York

September 3 - Battle of Cooch's Bridge - Delaware

September 11 - Battle of Brandywine - Pennsylvania

September 19 & October 7 - Battle of Saratoga - New York

September 21 - Paoli Massacre - Pennsylvania

September 26-November 16 - Siege of Fort Mifflin - Pennsylvania

October 4 - Battle of Germantown - Pennsylvania

October 6 - Battle of Forts Clinton & Montgomery - New York

October 22 - Battle of Red Bank - New Jersey

December 19-June 19, 1778 - Winter at Valley Forge - Pennsylvania

1778

June 28 - Battle of Monmouth - New Jersey

July 3 - Battle of Wyoming (Wyoming Massacre) - Pennsylvania

August 29 - Battle of Rhode Island - Rhode Island

1779

February 14 - Battle of Kettle Creek - Georgia

July 16 - Battle of Stony Point - New York

July 24-August 12 - Penobscot Expedition - Maine (Massachusetts)

August 19 - Battle of Paulus Hook - New Jersey

September 16-October 18 - Siege of Savannah - Georgia

September 23 - Battle of Flamborough Head ( Bonhomme Richard vs. HMS Serapis) - waters off Britain

1780

March 29-May 12 - Siege of Charleston - South Carolina

May 29 - Battle of Waxhaws - South Carolina

June 23 - Battle of Springfield - New Jersey

August 16 - Battle of Camden - South Carolina

October 7 - Battle of Kings Mountain - South Carolina

1781

January 5 - Battle of Jersey - Channel Islands

January 17 - Battle of Cowpens - South Carolina

March 15 - Battle of Guilford Court House - North Carolina

April 25 - Battle of Hobkirk's Hill - South Carolina

September 5 - Battle of the Chesapeake - waters off Virginia

September 6 - Battle of Groton Heights - Connecticut

September 8 - Battle of Eutaw Springs - South Carolina

September 28-October 19 - Battle of Yorktown - Virginia

1782

April 9-12 - Battle of the Saintes - Caribbean

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Fighting for Liberty: Battles of the American Revolution

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The battles of the American Revolution were fought as far north as Quebec and as far south as Savannah. As the war became global with the entry of France in 1778, other battles were fought overseas as the powers of Europe clashed.

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Overview of all things related to the American Revolution. Good resource to start with.

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The American Revolution was fought between 1775 and 1783 and was the result of increasing colonial unhappiness with British rule. During the American Revolution, American forces were constantly hampered by a lack of resources but managed to win critical victories which led to an alliance with France. With other European countries joining the fight, the conflict became increasingly global in nature forcing the British to divert resources away from North America. Following the American victory at Yorktown, fighting effectively ended and the war was concluded with the Treaty of Paris in 1783. The treaty saw Britain recognize American independence as well as determined boundaries and other rights.

The battles of the American Revolution were fought as far north as Quebec and as far south as Savannah. As the war became global with the entry of France in 1778, other battles were fought overseas as the powers of Europe clashed. Beginning in 1775, these battles brought to prominence previously quiet villages such as Lexington, Germantown, Saratoga, and Yorktown, forever linking their names with the cause of American independence. Fighting during the early years of the American Revolution was generally in the North, while the war shifted south after 1779. During the war, around 25,000 Americans died (approx. 8,000 in battle), while another 25,000 were wounded. British and German losses numbered around 20,000 and 7,500 respectively.

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The American Revolution was fought between 1775 and 1783 and was the result of increasing colonial unhappiness with British rule. During the American Revolution, American forces were constantly hampered by a lack of resources but managed to win critical victories which led to an alliance with France.

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Here you will find information about: battles, people, events, timelines, commanders and documents

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Welcome to The American Revolution Website

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This website has all different kinds of information about the Revolutionary War. Be sure to correc time period based on the titles of the sections. The first two sections will tell you about life before the Revolutionary War. The third section will tell you about things that happened leading up to the war. The third section will tell you about events during the war. The last section will tell you about finally getting independence and creating a new country.

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Main Index Page

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Main Index Page [ The History Place Main Page | The Rise of Adolf Hitler | The Triumph of Hitler | Defeat of Hitler | Timeline of World War II in Europe | Holocaust Timeline | Irish Potato Famine | Photo of the Week | This Month in History |

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In essence, the Boston Tea Party - a pivotal event in American history - was an act of American colonial defiance to "taxation without representation."

The American colonists, who were not represented in Parliament, felt Great Britain was unequally and unjustly taxing them for the costs of the French and Indian War.

In December 1600, the East India Company was incorporated by English royal charter to profit from trade with East and Southeast Asia; as well as India. Although it was originally organized as a monopolistic trading company, over a period of time it became more political in nature. The company was very influential, and its shareholders included some of the most prominent individuals in Great Britain. Originally, the company controlled a large area of India for trade purposes and even had its' own army to protect the Company's interests.

In the mid-18th century, tea from China became a very valuable and important import displacing cotton goods. By 1773, the American colonists were consuming an estimated 1.2 million pounds of imported tea each year. Well aware of this, the war-strapped British government sought to make even more money from the already-lucrative tea trade by imposing tea taxes onto the American colonies.

Decrease of Sales of Tea in America

In 1757, the East India Company began to evolve into a ruling enterprise in India after the Company's army defeated Siraj-ud-daulah, who was the last independent Nawab (governor) of Bengal at the Battle of Plassey. Within a few years, the Company was collecting revenues for the Mughal Emperor of India; which should have made the East India Company very wealthy. However, the famine of 1769-70 reduced India's population by as much as one-third along with the costs associated with maintaining a large army placed the Company on the verge of Bankruptcy. In addition, the East India Company had been operating at a significant loss due to a tremendous decrease in sales of tea to America.

This decline had begun in the mid-1760s after the high cost of British tea drove some American colonists to start a profitable industry of smuggling tea from the Dutch and other European markets. By 1773 nearly 90% of all tea sold in America was being imported illegally from the Dutch.

In response, the British Parliament passed the Tea Act on April 27, 1773, and on May 10, 1773, King George III placed his royal assent on this act. The major purpose of the passage of the Tea Act was to keep the East India Company from going bankrupt. Essentially, the Tea Act lowered the duty the Company paid on tea to the British government and in doing so gave the Company a monopoly on the American tea trade allowing them to sell directly to the colonists. Thus, East India Tea became the cheapest tea to be imported to the American colonies.

When the British Parliament proposed the Tea Act, there was a belief that the colonists would not object in any form to being able to purchase cheaper tea. However, Prime Minister Frederick, Lord North, failed to take into consideration not only the power of the colonial merchants who had been cut out as middlemen from the sales of tea but also the way the colonists would view this act as "taxation without representation." The colonists viewed it this way because the Tea Act intentionally left in place a duty on tea that entered the colonies yet it removed the same duty of tea that entered England.

After the enactment of the Tea Act, the East India Company shipped its' tea to several different colonial ports, including New York, Charleston, and Philadelphia all of which refused to allow the shipments to be brought ashore. The ships were forced to return to England.

In December 1773, three ships named the Dartmouth, the Eleanor, and the Beaver arrived in Boston Harbor carrying East India Company tea. The colonists demanded that the tea is turned away and sent back to England. However, the Massachusetts Governor, Thomas Hutchinson, refused to heed to the colonists' demands.

Dumping 342 Chests of Tea Into the Boston Harbor

On December 16, 1773, members of the Sons of Liberty, many dressed in disguise as Mohawk Indians, boarded three British ships docked in Boston harbor and dumped 342 chests of tea into the chilly waters of Boston Harbor. The sunken chests held over 45 tons of tea, worth almost $1 million today.

Many believe the colonists' actions had been spurred by the words of Samuel Adams during a meeting at the Old South Meeting House. In the meeting, Adams called on colonists from all towns surrounding Boston to "be in readiness in the most resolute manner to assist this Town in their efforts for saving this oppressed country."

The incident famously known as the Boston Tea Party was one of the leading acts of defiance by colonists that would come to full fruition a few years later in the Revolutionary War.

Interestingly enough, General Charles Cornwallis, who surrendered the British army to General George Washington at Yorktown on October 18, 1871, was the governor-general and commander in chief in India from 1786 until 1794.

Updated by Robert Longley

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Key Events Leading to the Boston Tea Party

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In essence, the Boston Tea Party - a pivotal event in American history - was an act of American colonial defiance to "taxation without representation." The American colonists, who were not represented in Parliament, felt Great Britain was unequally and unjustly taxing them for the costs of the French and Indian War.

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This site will let you read about many different aspects of the Revolutionary War. Just check out the titles and click on the one that you need information about.

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The road to Independence < History 1994 < American History From Revolution To Reconstruction and beyond

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About - Disclaimer - Copyright - Contact - © 1994-2012 GMW - University of Groningen - Humanities Computing

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Documents from the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention

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Documents from the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention

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Check out the real documents from the time of the Revolutionary War and when we became a country.

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About this Collection | Documents from the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention, 1774-1789 | Digital Collections | Library of Congress

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Contains 277 documents relating to the work of Congress and the drafting and ratification of the Constitution. Items include extracts of the journals of Congress, resolutions, proclamations, committee reports, treaties, and early printed versions of the United States Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.

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This link will take you to a web page that has a TON of articles about many different aspects of the American Revolution.

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Just how revolutionary was the American Revolution? Learn about the war and the events that precipitated it with these resources and study guides.

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Very kid friendly site from PBS with many different types of information about different aspects of the Revolution. Want a timeline of the events to help you put everything together? This site has a great one.

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Read all about it! These newspaper Chronicles let you experience first-hand the excitement and uncertainty of the American Revolution as it happened. Click on a city to read about the riveting historical headlines that shaped the war and America.

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LIBERTY! . Chronicle of the Revolution | PBS

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Read all about it! These newspaper Chronicles let you experience first-hand the excitement and uncertainty of the American Revolution as it happened. Click on a city to read about the riveting historical headlines that shaped the war and America.

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Everything you want to know about the Revolutionary War and more.

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Understanding the American Revolution and Beyond

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Learn about the Revolutionary War, Declaration of Independence, US Constitution, Bill of Rights and Founding Fathers. Everything you want to know about the American Revolution.

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Social Studies for Kids: The American Revolution

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Social Studies for Kids: The American Revolution

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Very kid friendly site about many things related to the Revolutionary War, including timelines and maps to help you visualize.

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The American Revolutionary War

The Revolutionary War was one of the most pivotal events in American History. These links will take you on a tour of the Revolution and its War.

The American Revolutionary War: Keeping Independence
The American Revolutionary War was a long time coming. Follow it from beginning to end in this easy-to-read, detailed article. Includes a list of Causes of the War.

The Continental Army suffered through a crushing winter at Valley Forge but emerged more resilient, if lacking in numbers.

The Jay Treaty closed off several outstanding issues from the treaty that ended the Revolutionary War and, in the process, became an intense dispute between the nation's first two political parties.

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The American Revolutionary War The Revolutionary War was one of the most pivotal events in American History. These links will take you on a tour of the Revolution and its War. The American Revolutionary War: Keeping Independence The American Revolutionary War was a long time coming.

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Captain Prescott and the Boston Massacre

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Captain Prescott and the Boston Massacre

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First person account from Captain Prescott who was a British soldier at the Boston Massacre. This is actually from what he said during the trial after the massacre.

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It is [a] matter of too great notoriety to need any proofs that the arrival of his Majesty's troops in Boston was extremely obnoxious to its inhabitants. They have ever used all means in their power to weaken the regiments, and to bring them into contempt by promoting and aiding desertions, and with impunity, even where there has been the clearest evidence of the fact, and by grossly and falsely propagating untruths concerning them. On the arrival of the 64th and 65th their ardour seemingly began to abate; it being too expensive to buy off so many, and attempts of that kind rendered too dangerous from the numbers

And has ever since their departure been breaking out with greater violence after their embarkation. One of their justices, most thoroughly acquainted with the people and their intentions, on the trial of a man of the 14th Regiment, openly and publicly in the hearing of great numbers of people and from the seat of justice, declared "that the soldiers must now take care of themselves, nor trust too much to their arms, for they were but a handful; that the inhabitants carried weapons concealed under their clothes, and would destroy them in a moment, if they pleased". This, considering the malicious temper of the people, was an alarming circumstance to the soldiery. Since which several disputes have happened between the townspeople and the soldiers of both regiments, the former being encouraged thereto by the countenance of even some of the magistrates, and by the protection of all the party against government. In general such disputes have been kept too secret from the offi- cers. On the 2d instant two of the 29th going through one Gray's ropewalk, the rope-makers insultingly asked them if they would empty a vault. This unfortunately had the desired effect by provoking the soldiers, and from words they went to blows. Both parties suffered in this afftay, and finally the soldiers retired to their quarters. The officers, on the first knowledge of this transaction, took every precaution in their power to prevent any ill consequence. Notwithstanding which, single quarrels could not be prevented, the inhabitants constantly provoking and abusing the soldiery. The insolence as well as utter hatred of the inhabitants to the troops increased daily, insomuch that Monday and Tuesday, the 5th and 6th instant, were privately agreed on for a general engagement, in consequence of which several of the militia came from the country armed to join their friends, menacing to destroy any who should oppose them. This plan has since been discovered.

On Monday night about 8 o'clock two soldiers were attacked and beat. But the party of the townspeople in order to carry matters to the utmost length, broke into two meeting houses and rang the alarm bells, which I supposed was for fire as usual, but was soon undeceived. About 9 some of the guard came to and informed me the town inhabitants were assembling to attack the troops, and that the bells were ringing as the signal for that purpose and not for fire, and the beacon intended to be fired to bring in the distant people of the country. This, as I was captain of the day, occasioned my repairing immediately to the main guard. In my way there I saw the people in great commotion, and heard them use the most cruel and horrid threats against the troops. In a few minutes after I reached the guard, about 100 people passed it and went towards the custom house where the king's money is lodged. They immediately surrounded the sentry posted there, and with clubs and other weapons threatened to execute their vengeance on him. I was soon informed by a townsman their intention was to carry off the soldier from his post and probably murder him. On which I desired him to return for further intelligence, and he soon came back and assured me he heard the mobb declare they would murder him. This I feared might be a prelude to their plundering the king's chest. I immediately sent a non-commissioned officer and 12 men to protect both the sentry and the king's money, and very soon followed myself to prevent, if possible, all disorder, fearing lest the officer and soldiers, by the insults and provocations of the rioters, should be thrown off their guard and commit some rash act. They soon rushed through the people, and by charging their bayonets in half-circles, kept them at a little distance. Nay, so far was I from intending the death of any person that I suffered the troops to go to the spot where the unhappy affair took place without any loading in their pieces; nor did I ever give orders for loading them. This remiss conduct in me perhaps merits censure; yet it is evidence, resulting from the nature of things, which is the best and surest that can be offered, that my intention was not to act offensively, but the contrary part, and that not without compulsion. The mob still increased and were more outrageous, striking their clubs or bludgeons one against another, and calling out, come on you rascals, you bloody backs, you lobster scoundrels, fire if you dare, G-d damn you, fire and be damned, we know you dare not, and much more such language was used. At this time I was between the soldiers and the mob, parleying with, and endeavouring all in my power to persuade them to retire peaceably, but to no purpose. They advanced to the points of the bayonets, struck some of them and even the muzzles of the pieces, and seemed to be endeavouring to close with the soldiers. On which some well behaved persons asked me if the guns were charged. I replied yes. They then asked me if I intended to order the men to fire. I answered no, by no means, observing to them that I was advanced before the muzzles of the men's pieces, and must fall a sacrifice if they fired; that the soldiers were upon the half cock and charged bayonets, and my giving the word fire under those circumstances would prove me to be no officer. While I was thus speaking, one of the soldiers having received a severe blow with a stick, stepped a little on one side and instantly fired, on which turning to and asking him why he fired without orders, I was struck with a club on my arm, which for some time deprived me of the use of it, which blow had it been placed on my head, most probably would have destroyed me.
On this a general attack was made on the men by a great number of heavy clubs and snowballs being thrown at them, by which all our lives were in imminent danger, some persons at the same time from behind calling out, damn your bloods-why don't you fire. Instantly three or four of the soldiers fired, one after another, and directly after three more in the same confusion and hurry. The mob then ran away, except three unhappy men who instantly expired, in which number was Mr. Gray at whose rope-walk the prior quarrels took place; one more is since dead, three others are dangerously, and four slightly wounded. The whole of this melancholy affair was transacted in almost 20 minutes. On my asking the soldiers why they fired without orders, they said they heard the word fire and supposed it came from me. This might be the case as many of the mob called out fire, fire, but I assured the men that I gave no such order; that my words were, don't fire, stop your firing. In short, it was scarcely possible for the soldiers to know who said fire, or don't fire, or stop your firing. On the people's assembling again to take away the dead bodies, the soldiers supposing them coming to attack them, were making ready to fire again, which I prevented by striking up their firelocks with my hand. Immediately after a townsman came and told me that 4 or 5000 people were assembled in the next street, and had sworn to take my life with every man's with me. On which I judged it unsafe to remain there any longer, and therefore sent the party and sentry to the main guard, where the street is narrow and short, there telling them off into street firings, divided and planted them at each end of the street to secure their rear, momently expecting an attack, as there was a constant cry of the inhabitants to arms, to arms, turn out with your guns; and the town drums beating to arms, I ordered my drums to beat to arms, and being soon after joined by the different companies of the 29th regiment, I formed them as the guard into street firings. The 14th regiment also got under arms but remained at their barracks. I immediately sent a sergeant with a party to Colonel Dalrymple, the commanding officer, to acquaint him with every particular. Several officers going to join their regiment were knocked down by the mob, one very much wounded and his sword taken from him. The lieutenant-governor and Colonel Carr soon after met at the head of the 29th regiment and agreed that the regiment should retire to their barracks, and the people to their houses, but I kept the picket to strengthen the guard. It was with great difficulty that the lieutenant-governor prevailed on the people to be quiet and retire. At last they all went off, excepting about a hundred.

A Council was immediately called, on the breaking up of which three justices met and issued a warrant to apprehend me and eight soldiers. On hearing of this procedure I instantly went to the sheriff and surrendered myself, though for the space of 4 hours I had it in my power to have made my escape, which I most undoubtedly should have attempted and could easily executed, had I been the least conscious of any guilt. On the examination before the justices, two witnesses swore that I gave the men orders to fire. The one testified he was within two feet of me; the other that I swore at the men for not firing at the first word. Others swore they heard me use the word "fire," but whether do or do not fire, they could not say; others that they heard the word fire, but could not say if it came from me. The next day they got 5 or 6 more to swear I gave the word to fire. So bitter and inveterate are many of the malcontents here that they are industriously using every method to fish out evidence to prove it was a concerted scheme to murder the inhabitants. Others are infusing the utmost malice and revenge into the minds of the people who are to be my jurors by false publications, votes of towns, and all other artifices. That so from a settled rancour against the officers and troops in general, the suddenness of my trial after the affair while the people's minds are all greatly inflamed, I am, though perfectly innocent, under most unhappy circumstances, having nothing in reason to expect but the loss of life in a very ignominous manner, without the interposition of his Majesty's royal goodness.

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Captain Preston's account of the Boston Massacre March 5 1770

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It is [a] matter of too great notoriety to need any proofs that the arrival of his Majesty's troops in Boston was extremely obnoxious to its inhabitants.

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This is also a first person report of what happened at the Boston Massacre. This actual testimony from the time, but the person did not want to be known.

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THE HORRID MASSACRE IN BOSTON, PERPETRATED IN THE EVENING OF THE FIFTH DAY OF MARCH, 1770, BY SOLDIERS OF THE TWENTY-NINTH REGIMENT WHICH WITH THE FOURTEENTH REGIMENT WERE THEN QUARTERED THERE; WITH SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE STATE OF THINGS PRIOR TO THAT CATASTROPHE It may be a proper introduction to this narrative, briefly to represent the state of things for some time previous to the said Massacre; and this seems necessary in order to the forming a just idea of the causes of it.

At the end of the late [French and Indian] war, in which this province bore so distinguished a part, a happy union subsisted between Great Britain and the colonies. This was unfortunately interrupted by the Stamp Act; but it was in some measure restored by the repeal of it. It was again interrupted by other acts of parliament for taxing America; and by the appointment of a Board of Commissioners, in pursuance of an act, which by the face of it was made for the relief and encouragement of commerce, but which in its operation, it was apprehended, would have, and it has in fact had, a contrary effect. By the said act the said Commissioners were "to be resident in some convenient part of his Majesty's dominions in America." This must be understood to be in some part convenient for the whole. But it does not appear that, in fixing the place of their residence, the convenience of the whole was at all consulted, for Boston, being very far from the centre of the colonies, could not be the place most convenient for the whole. Judging by the act, it may seem this town was intended to be favored, by the Commissioners being appointed to reside here; and that the consequence of that residence would be the relief and encouragement of commerce; but the reverse has been the constant and uniform effect of it; so that the commerce of the town, from the embarrassments in which it has been lately involved, is greatly reduced.

The residence of the Commissioners here has been detrimental, not only to the commerce, but to the political interests of the town and province; and not only so, but we can trace from it the causes of the late horrid massacre. Soon after their arrival here in November, 1767, instead of confining themselves to the proper business of their office, they became partizans of Governor Bernard in his political schemes; and had the weakness and temerity to infringe upon one of the most essential rights of the house of commons of this province-that of giving their votes with freedom, and not being accountable therefor but to their constituents. One of the members of that house, Capt. Timothy Folgier, having voted in some affair contrary to the mind of the said Commissioners, was for so doing dismissed from the office he held under them.

These proceedings of theirs, the difficulty of access to them on office-business, and a supercilious behavior, rendered them disgustful to people in general, who in consequence thereof treated them with neglect. This probably stimulated them to resent it; and to make their resentment felt, they and their coadjutor, Governor Bernard, made such representations to his Majesty's ministers as they thought best calculated to bring the displeasure of the nation upon the town and province; and in order that those representations might have the more weight, they are said to have contrived and executed plans for exciting disturbances and tumults, which otherwise would probably never have existed; and, when excited, to have transmitted to the ministry the most exaggerated accounts of them.

Unfortunately for us, they have been too successful in their said representations, which, in conjunction with Governor Bernard's, have occasioned his Majesty's faithful subjects of this town and province to be treated as enemies and rebels, by an invasion of the town by sea and land; to which the approaches were made with all the circumspection usual where a vigorous opposition is expected. While the town was surrounded by a considerable number of his Majesty's ships of war, two regiments landed and took possession of it; and to support these, two other regiments arrived some time after from Ireland; one of which landed at Castle Island, and the other in the town.

Thus were we, in aggravation of our other embarrassments, embarrassed with troops, forced upon us contrary to our inclination-contrary to the spirit of Magna Charta-contrary to the very letter of the Bill of Rights, in which it is declared, that the raising or keeping a standing army within the kingdom in time of peace, unless it be with the consent of parliament, is against law, and without the desire of the civil magistrates, to aid whom was the pretence for sending the troops hither; who were quartered in the town in direct violation of an act of parliament for quartering troops in America; and all this in consequence of the representations of the said Commissioners and the said Governor, as appears by their memorials and letters lately published.

As they were the procuring cause of troops being sent hither, they must therefore be the remote and a blameable cause of all the disturbances and bloodshed that have taken place in consequence of that measure.

We shall next attend to the conduct of the troops, and to some circumstances relative to them. Governor Bernard without consulting the Council, having given up the State House to the troops at their landing, they took possession of the chambers, where the representatives of the province and the courts of law held their meetings; and (except the council-chamber) of all other parts of that house; in which they continued a considerable time, to the great annoyance of those courts while they sat, and of the merchants and gentlemen of the town, who had always made the lower floor of it their exchange. They [the merchants] had a right so to do, as the property of it was in the town; but they were deprived of that right by mere power. The said Governor soon after, by every stratagem and by every method but a forcibly entry, endeavored to get possession of the manufactory-house, to make a barrack of it for the troops; and for that purpose caused it to be besieged by the troops, and the people in it to be used very cruelly;

The General Court, at the first session after the arrival of the troops, viewed it in this light, and applied to Governor Bernard to cause such a nuisance to be removed; but to no purpose.

the challenging the inhabitants by sentinels posted in all parts of the town before the lodgings of officers, which (for about six months, while it lasted), occasioned many quarrels and uneasiness.

Capt. Wilson, of the 59th, exciting the negroes of the town to take away their masters' lives and property, and repair to the army for protection, which was fully proved against him. The attack of a party of soldiers on some of the magistrates of the town-the repeated rescues of soldiers from peace officers-the firing of a loaded musket in a public street, to the endangering a great number of peaceable inhabitants-the frequent wounding of persons by their bayonets and cutlasses, and the numerous instances of bad behavior in the soldiery, made us early sensible that the troops were not sent here for any benefit to the town or province, and that we had no good to expect from such conservators of the peace.

It was not expected, however, that such an outrage and massacre, as happened here on the evening of the fifth instant, would have been perpetrated. There were then killed and wounded, by a discharge of musketry, eleven of his Majesty's subjects, viz.:

Mr. Samuel Gray, killed on the spot by a ball entering his head.

Crispus Attucks, a mulatto, killed on the spot, two balls entering his breast.

Mr. James Caldwell, killed on the spot, by two balls entering his back.

Mr. Samuel Maverick, a youth of seventeen years of age, mortally wounded; he died the next morning.

Mr. Patrick Carr mortally wounded; he died the 14th instant.

Christopher Monk and John Clark, youths about seventeen years of age, dangerously wounded. It is apprehended they will die.

Mr. Edward Payne, merchant, standing at his door; wounded.

Messrs. John Green, Robert Patterson, and David Parker; all danger- ously wounded.

The actors in this dreadful tragedy were a party of soldiers commanded by Capt. Preston of the 29th regiment. This party, including the Captain, consisted of eight, who are all committed to jail.

There are depositions in this affair which mention, that several guns were fired at the same time from the Custom-house; before which this shocking scene was exhibited. Into this matter inquisition is now making. In the meantime it may be proper to insert here the substance of some of those depositions.

Benjamin Frizell, on the evening of the 5th of March, having taken his station near the west corner of the Custom-house in King street, before and at the time of the soldiers firing their guns, declares (among other things) that the first discharge was only of one gun, the next of two guns, upon which he the deponent thinks he saw a man stumble; the third discharge was of three guns, upon which he thinks he saw two men fall; and immediately after were discharged five guns, two of which were by soldiers on his right hand; the other three, as appeared to the deponent, were discharged from the balcony, or the chamber window of the Custom-house, the flashes appearing on the left hand, and higher than the right hand flashes appeared to be, and of which the deponent was very sensible, although his eyes were much turned to the soldiers, who were all on his right hand.

What gave occasion to the melancholy event of that evening seems to have been this. A difference having happened near Mr. Grays ropewalk, between a soldier and a man belonging to it, the soldier challenged the ropemakers to a boxing match. The challenge was accepted by one of them, and the soldier worsted. He ran to the barrack in the neighborhood, and returned with several of his companions. The fray was renewed, and the soldiers were driven off. They soon returned with recruits and were again worsted. This happened several times, till at length a considerable body of soldiers was collected, and they also were driven off, the ropemakers having been joined by their brethren of the contiguous ropewalks. By this time Mr. Gray being alarmed interposed, and with the assistance of some gentlemen prevented any further disturbance. To satisfy the soldiers and punish the man who had been the occasion of the first difference, and as an example to the rest, he turned him out of his service; and waited on Col. Dalrymple, the commanding officer of the troops, and with him concerted measures for preventing further mischief. Though this affair ended thus, it made a strong impression on the minds of the soldiers in general, who thought the honor of the regiment concerned to revenge those repeated repulses. For this purpose they seem to have formed a combination to commit some outrage upon the inhabitants of the town indiscriminately; and this was to be done on the evening of the 5th instant or soon after; as appears by the depositions of the following persons, viz.:

William Newhall declares, that on Thursday night the 1st of March instant, he met four soldiers of the 29th regiment, and that he heard them say, "there were a great many that would eat their dinners on Monday next, that should not eat any on Tuesday." <

Daniel Calfe declares, that on Saturday evening the 3d of March, a camp-woman, wife to James McDeed, a grenadier of the 29th, came into his father's shop, and the people talking about the affrays at the ropewalks, and blaming the soldiers for the part they had acted in it, the woman said, "the soldiers were in the right;" adding, "that before Tuesday or Wednesday night they would wet their swords or bayonets in New England people's blood."

Samuel Drowne declares that, about nine o'clock of the evening of the fifth of March current, standing at his own door in Cornhill, he saw about fourteen or fifteen soldiers of the 29th regiment, who came from Murray's barracks, armed with naked cutlasses, swords, &c., and came upon the inhabitants of the town, then standing or walking in Coruhffl, and abused some, and violently assaulted others as they met them; most of whom were without so much as a stick in their hand to defend themselves, as he very clearly could discern, it being moonlight, and himself being one of the assaulted persons. All or most of the said soldiers he saw go into King street (some of them through Royal Exchange lane), and there followed them, and soon discovered them to be quarrelling and fighting with the people whom they saw there, which he thinks were not more than a dozen, when the soldiers came first, armed as aforesaid. Of those dozen people, the most of them were gentlemen, standing together a little below the Town House, upon the Exchange. At the appearance of those soldiers so armed, the most of the twelve persons went off, some of them being first assaulted.

The violent proceedings of this party, and their going into King street, "quarrelling and fighting with the people whom they saw there" (mentioned in Mr. Drowne's deposition), was immediately introductory to the grand catastrophe.

These assailants, who issued from Murray's barracks (so called), after attacking and wounding divers persons in Cornhill, as abovementioned, being armed, proceeded (most of them) up the Royal Exchange lane into King street; where, making a short stop, and after assaulting and driving away the few they met there, they brandished their arms and cried out, "where are the boogers! where are the cowards!" At this time there were very few persons in the street beside themselves. This party in proceeding from Exchange lane into King street, must pass the sentry posted at the westerly corner of the Custom House, which butts on that lane and fronts on that street. This is needful to be mentioned, as near that spot and in that street the bloody tragedy was acted, and the street actors in it were stationed: their station being but a few feet from the front side of the said Custom House. The outrageous behavior and the threats of the said party occasioned the ringing of the meeting-house bell near the head of King street, which bell ringing quick, as for fire, it presently brought out a number of inhabitants, who being soon sensible of the occasion of it, were naturally led to King street, where the said party had made a stop but a little while before, and where their stopping had drawn together a number of boys, round the sentry at the Custom House. whether the boys mistook the sentry for one of the said party, and thence took occasion to differ with him, or whether he first affronted them, which is affirmed in several depositions,-however that may be, there was much foul language between them, and some of them, in consequence of his pushing at them with his bayonet, threw snowballs at him, which occasioned him to knock hastily at the door of the Custom House. From hence two persons thereupon proceeded immediately to the main-guard, which was posted opposite to the State House, at a small distance, near the head of the said street. The officer on guard was Capt. Preston, who with seven or eight soldiers, with fire-arms and charged bayonets, issued from the guardhouse, and in great haste posted himself and his soldiers in front of the Custom House, near the corner aforesaid. In passing to this station the soldiers pushed several persons with their bayonets, driving through the people in so rough a manner that it appeared they intended to create a disturbance. This occasioned some snowballs to be thrown at them which seems to have been the only provocation that was given. Mr. Knox (between whom and Capt. Preston there was some conversation on the spot) declares, that while he was talking with Capt. Preston, the soldiers of his detachment had attacked the people with their bayonets and that there was not the least provocation given to Capt. Preston of his party; the backs of the people being toward them when the people were attacked. He also declares, that Capt. Preston seemed to be in great haste and much agitated, and that, according to his opinion, there were not then present in King street above seventy or eighty persons at the extent.

The said party was formed into a half circle; and within a short time after they had been posted at the Custom House, began to fire upon the people.

Captain Preston is said to have ordered them to fire, and to have repeated that order. One gun was fired first; then others in succession and with deliberation, till ten or a dozen guns were fired; or till that number of discharges were made from the guns that were fired. By which means eleven persons were killed and wounded, as above represented.

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Anonymous account of the Boston Massacre March 5 1770

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THE HORRID MASSACRE IN BOSTON, PERPETRATED IN THE EVENING OF THE FIFTH DAY OF MARCH, 1770, BY SOLDIERS OF THE TWENTY-NINTH REGIMENT WHICH WITH THE FOURTEENTH REGIMENT WERE THEN QUARTERED THERE; WITH SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE STATE OF THINGS PRIOR TO THAT CATASTROPHE It may be a proper introduction to this narrative, briefly to represent the state of things for some time previous to the said Massacre; and this seems necessary in order to the forming a just idea of the causes of it.

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Eyewitness account of the Boston Tea Party

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Eyewitness account of the Boston Tea Party

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This is a first person account of the Boston Tea Party. This person was really there.

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George Robert Twelve Hewes, a Boston shoemaker, participated in many of the key events of the Revolutionary crisis. Over half a century later, Hewes described his experiences to James Hawkes. When Parliament passed the Tea Act in 1773, colonists refused to allow cargoes of tea to be unloaded. In the evening of December 16, with Hewes leading one group, the colonists dressed in "the costume of a Indian." They boarded the ships in Boston harbor and dropped the tea overboard. Hewes' account shed light on how resistance became revolution. The"Boston Tea Party," as it became known in the 19th century, became a powerful symbol of the Revolution. And Hewes, artisan and ordinary citizen, was celebrated as a venerable veteran of the struggle for Independence.

The tea destroyed was contained in three ships, lying near each other at what was called at that time Griffin's wharf, and were surrounded by armed ships of war, the commanders of which had publicly declared that if the rebels, as they were pleased to style the Bostonians, should not withdraw their opposition to the landing of the tea before a certain day, the 17th day of December, 1773, they should on that day force it on shore, under the cover of their cannon's mouth.

On the day preceding the seventeenth, there was a meeting of the citizens of the county of Suffolk, convened at one of the churches in Boston, for the purpose of consulting on what measures might be considered expedient to prevent the landing of the tea, or secure the people from the collection of the duty. At that meeting a committee was appointed to wait on Governor Hutchinson, and request him to inform them whether he would take any measures to satisfy the people on the object of the meeting.

To the first application of this committee, the Governor told them he would give them a definite answer by five o'clock in the afternoon. At the hour appointed, the committee again repaired to the Governor's house, and on inquiry found he had gone to his country seat at Milton, a distance of about six miles. When the committee returned and informed the meeting of the absence of the Governor, there was a confused murmur among the members, and the meeting was immediately dissolved, many of them crying out, "Let every man do his duty, and be true to his country"; and there was a general huzza for Griffin's wharf.

It was now evening, and I immediately dressed myself in the costume of an Indian, equipped with a small hatchet, which I and my associates denominated the tomahawk, with which, and a club, after having painted my face and hands with coal dust in the shop of a blacksmith, I repaired to Griffin's wharf, where the ships lay that contained the tea. When I first appeared in the street after being thus disguised, I fell in with many who were dressed, equipped and painted as I was, and who fell in with me and marched in order to the place of our destination.

When we arrived at the wharf, there were three of our number who assumed an authority to direct our operations, to which we readily submitted. They divided us into three parties, for the purpose of boarding the three ships which contained the tea at the same time. The name of him who commanded the division to which I was assigned was Leonard Pitt. The names of the other commanders I never knew.

We were immediately ordered by the respective commanders to board all the ships at the same time, which we promptly obeyed. The commander of the division to which I belonged, as soon as we were on board the ship appointed me boatswain, and ordered me to go to the captain and demand of him the keys to the hatches and a dozen candles. I made the demand accordingly, and the captain promptly replied, and delivered the articles; but requested me at the same time to do no damage to the ship or rigging.

We then were ordered by our commander to open the hatches and take out all the chests of tea and throw them overboard, and we immediately proceeded to execute his orders, first cutting and splitting the chests with our tomahawks, so as thoroughly to expose them to the effects of the water.

In about three hours from the time we went on board, we had thus broken and thrown overboard every tea chest to be found in the ship, while those in the other ships were disposing of the tea in the same way, at the same time. We were surrounded bv British armed ships, but no attempt was made to resist us.

We then quietly retired to our several places of residence, without having any conversation with each other, or taking any measures to discover who were our associates; nor do I recollect of our having had the knowledge of the name of a single individual concerned in that affair, except that of Leonard Pitt, the commander of my division, whom I have mentioned. There appeared to be an understanding that each individual should volunteer his services, keep his own secret, and risk the consequence for himself. No disorder took place during that transaction, and it was observed at that time that the stillest night ensued that Boston had enjoyed for many months.

During the time we were throwing the tea overboard, there were several attempts made by some of the citizens of Boston and its vicinity to carry off small quantities of it for their family use. To effect that object, they would watch their opportunity to snatch up a handful from the deck, where it became plentifully scattered, and put it into their pockets.

One Captain O'Connor, whom I well knew, came on board for that purpose, and when he supposed he was not noticed, filled his pockets, and also the lining of his coat. But I had detected him and gave information to the captain of what he was doing. We were ordered to take him into custody, and just as he was stepping from the vessel, I seized him by the skirt of his coat, and in attempting to pull him back, I tore it off; but, springing forward, by a rapid effort he made his escape. He had, however, to run a gauntlet through the crowd upon the wharf nine each one, as he passed, giving him a kick or a stroke.

Another attempt was made to save a little tea from the ruins of the cargo by a tall, aged man who wore a large cocked hat and white wig, which was fashionable at that time. He had sleightly slipped a little into his pocket, but being detected, they seized him and, taking his hat and wig from his head, threw them, together with the tea, of which they had emptied his pockets, into the water. In consideration of his advanced age, he was permitted to escape, with now and then a slight kick.

The next morning, after we had cleared the ships of the tea, it was discovered that very considerable quantities of it were floating upon the surface of the water; and to prevent the possibility of any of its being saved for use, a number of small boats were manned by sailors and citizens, who rowed them into those parts of the harbor wherever the tea was visible, and by beating it with oars and paddles so thoroughly drenched it as to render its entire destruction inevitable.

-- George Hewes

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George Robert Twelve Hewes, a Boston shoemaker, participated in many of the key events of the Revolutionary crisis. Over half a century later, Hewes described his experiences to James Hawkes. When Parliament passed the Tea Act in 1773, colonists refused to allow cargoes of tea to be unloaded.

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Spy Letters from the American Revolution

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Spy Letters from the American Revolution

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Here you will find real letters written by real spies during the American Revolution

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The Revolutionary War was not fought by proclamations and battles alone. A major component of the war was the challenge of organizing military strategies over thousands of miles of battlefield. From the very beginning of the war, a complex network of spies, double agents, and traitors began to emerge in an effort to learn the plans of the enemy before they were enacted. The preservation and availability of the Sir Henry Clinton collection at the Clements Library provides an amazingly complete look at the everyday intelligence operations of both the British and American armies. Many of the letters highlighted in this digital exhibit were pivotal to the success and failures of sieges, battles, and surprise attacks.

The exhibit aims to showcase the spy letters of the Sir Henry Clinton Papers and to situate them in an educational framework. The letters form the core of the exhibit. Because the exhibit provides large, readable images of the letters as well as transcriptions, the letters may be used substantively in the classroom. Furthermore, the letters may be accessed and understood in multiple ways. The letters may be reached through their stories, their methods, a timeline, biographies, or a map. The stories provide background contextual information about each letter; while the methods describe their techniques and formats. The map provides a visual representation of the letters' travels. Biographies and a timeline provide supplementary information for further reference. Prints, portraits, and maps also supply additional background to the contents of the letters.

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Spy Letters of the American Revolution - UM Clements Library

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The exhibit aims to showcase the spy letters of the Sir Henry Clinton Papers and to situate them in an educational framework. During the war, a complex network of spies, double agents, and traitors emerged in an effort to learn the plans of the enemy before they were enacted.

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Scroll down to watch a variety of videos about different topics of the Revolutionary War.

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Scroll down at this link to watch a videos about a variety of topics about the Revolutionary War.

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American Revolution for Kids - History Games and Videos

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American Revolution for Kids - Interesting videos, lessons, quiz games, interactive diagrams, presentations and activities on American Revolution.

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This timeline will help you understand the order of the events of the war. You can also click on the links to learn more about each topic.

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The French and Indian War

June 19-July 11: The Albany Congress

Oct. 7: Proclamation of 1763

April 5: The Sugar Act
September 1: The Currency Act

March 22: The Stamp Act
March 24: The Quartering Act of 1765
May 29: Patrick Henry's "If this be treason, make the most of it!" speech
May 30: The Virginia Stamp Act Resolutions
Oct. 7-25: The Stamp Act Congress

March 18: The Declaratory Act

June 29: The Townshend Revenue Act

August 1: Boston Non-Importation Agreement

March 5: The Boston Massacre

June 9: The Gaspee Affair

May 10: The Tea Act Dec. 16: The Boston Tea Party

March 31: Boston Port Act, one of the " Intolerable Acts" May 20: Administration of Justice Act, one of the " Intolerable Acts" May 20: Massachusetts Government Act, one of the " Intolerable Acts" June 2: Quartering Act of 1774, one of the " Intolerable Acts" June 22: Quebec Act, one of the " Intolerable Acts" Sept. 5-Oct. 26: The First Continental Congress meets in Philadelphia and issues Declaration and Resolves Oct. 10: Battle of Point Pleasant, Virginia (disputed as to whether it was a battle of the American Revolution or the culmination of Lord Dunmore's War) Oct. 20: The Association (prohibition of trade with Great Britain) Oct. 24: Galloway's Plan rejected

March 23: Patrick Henry's "Give me liberty or give me death" speech Apr. 18: The Rides of Paul Revere and William Dawes Apr. 19: Minutemen and redcoats clash at Lexington and Concord, "the shot heard 'round the world." May 10: Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys seize Fort Ticonderoga May 10: The Second Continental Congress meets in Philadelphia June 15: George Washington named Commander-in-Chief June 17: Battle of Bunker Hill: The British drive the Americans from Breed's Hill July 3: Washington assumes command of the Continental Army Nov. 13: Richard Montgomery's Continental Army forces occupy Montreal in Canada Dec. 11: Virginia and NC patriots rout Loyalist troops and burn Norfolk Dec. 22: Colonel Thomson with 1,500 rangers and militia capture Loyalists at Great Canebrake, SC Dec. 23-30: Snow Campaign, in SC, so called because patriots are impeded by 15" of snow Dec. 30-31: American forces under Benedict Arnold fail to seize Quebec

Jan. 1: Daniel Morgan is taken prisoner during his attempt to take Quebec City Jan. 15: Paine's Common Sense published Feb. 27: Revolutionaries drive the loyalists from Moore's Creek Bridge, North Carolina March 3: The Continental fleet captures New Providence Island in the Bahamas March 17: The British evacuate Boston; British Navy moves to Halifax, Canada June 8: Revolutionaries fail to take Three Rivers, Quebec June 12: The Virginia Declaration of Rights June 28: Sullivan's Island, SC, failed British naval attack June 29: The First Virginia Constitution June 28: American forces decisively defeat the British Navy at Fort Moultrie, South Carolina July 1: At the instigation of British agents, the Cherokee attack along the entire southern frontier July 1-4: Congress debates and revises the Declaration of Independence. See Chronology of the Declaration July 4: Congress adopts the Declaration of Independence; it's sent to the printer July 8: The Declaration of Independence is read publicly July 15: Lyndley's Fort, SC, Patriots fend off attack by Indians and Tories dressed as Indians Aug. 1: Ambushed by Cherokees, Patriots are saved by a mounted charge at Seneca, SC Aug. 2: Delegates begin to sign The Declaration of Independence Aug. 10: Tugaloo River, SC, Andrew Pickens defeats Cherokees Aug. 12: Andrew Pickens' detachment surrounded by 185 Cherokee Indians, forms a ring and fires outward. It is known as the "Ring Fight." Aug. 12: Colonel David Williamson and Andrew Pickens burn Tamassy, an Indian town Aug. 27: Redcoats defeat George Washington's army in the Battle of Long Island. Washington's army escapes at night. Sept. 15: The British occupy New York City Sept. 16: Generals George Washington, Nathanael Greene, and Israel Putnam triumphantly hold their ground at the Battle of Harlem Heights Sept. 19: Colonel David Williamson's Pennsylvania militia forces attacked by Cherokees at Coweecho River, NC Oct. 11: Benedict Arnold defeated at the Battle of Valcour Island (Lake Champlain), but delayed British advance Oct. 28: The Americans retreat from White Plains, New York. British casualties (~300) higher than American (~200). Nov. 16: The Hessians capture Fort Washington, NY Nov. 20: Lord Cornwallis captures Fort Lee from Nathanael Greene Dec. 26: Washington crosses the Delaware and captures Trenton from Hessians

Jan. 3: Washington victorious at Princeton Jan. 6-May 28: Washington winters in Morristown, NJ Apr. 27: Benedict Arnold's troops force a British retreat at Ridgefield, Connecticut. May 20: Treaty of DeWitt's Corner, SC: Cherokees lose most of their land east of the mountains June 14: Flag Resolution July 5: St. Clair surrenders Fort Ticonderoga to the British July 27: Lafayette arrives in Philadelphia Aug. 6: The Redcoats, with Iroquois support, force the patriots back at Oriskany, NY, but then have to evacuate Aug. 16: American Militia under General Stark victorious at the Battle of Bennington, VT (actually fought in Walloomsac, New York, several miles to the west) Aug. 23: British withdraw from Fort Stanwix, NY, upon hearing of Benedict Arnold's approach Aug. 25: British General Howe lands at Head of Elk, Maryland Sept. 11: The British win the Battle of Brandywine, Pennsylvania Sept. 16: Rainout at the Battle of the Clouds, Pennsylvania Sept. 19: Burgoyne checked by Americans under Gates at Freeman's Farm, NY. This is part of the "Battles of Saratoga." Sept. 21: Paoli Massacre, PA Sept. 26: British under Howe occupy Philadelphia Oct. 4: Americans driven off at the Battle of Germantown Oct. 7: Burgoyne loses second battle of Freeman's Farm, NY (at Bemis Heights). This is part of the "Battles of Saratoga." Oct. 17: Burgoyne surrenders to American General Gates at Saratoga, NY Oct. 22: Hessian attack on Fort Mercer, NJ repulsed Nov. 16: British capture Fort Mifflin, Pennsylvania Dec. 5-7: Americans repulse British at Whitemarsh, Pennsylvania Dec. 19: Washington's army retires to winter quarters at Valley Forge

Feb. 6: The United States and France sign the French Alliance March 7: British General William Howe replaced by Henry Clinton May 20: Battle of Barren Hill, Pennsylvania. Lafayette with 500 men and about 50 Oneida Indians successfully evade British onslaught June 18: British abandon Philadelphia and return to New York June 19: Washington's army leaves Valley Forge June 28: The Battle of Monmouth Court House ends in a draw July 4: George Rogers Clark captures Kaskaskia, a French village south of St. Louis Aug. 8: French and American forces besiege Newport, RI Sept. 28: The Tappan Massacre ("No Flint" Grey kills 30 Americans by bayonet) Dec. 29: The redcoats occupy Savannah

Feb. 3: Major General Moultrie defeats British detachment at Port Royal Island, SC Feb. 14: Patriots Andrew Pickens and Elijah Clarke beat Loyalists at Kettle Creek, GA Feb. 23-24: American George Rogers Clark captures Vincennes (in what is now Indiana) on the Wabash in the Western campaign March 3: British Lt. Colonel Jacques Marcus Prévost defeats Americans under General John Ashe at Brier Creek, GA May 11-13: Major General Augustin Prévost (brother of Jacques, see above) breaks his siege when American forces under Major General Lincoln approach June 20: Stono River, SC, Major General Lincoln inflicts extensive British casualties in indecisive battle June 21: Spain declares war on Great Britain July 8: Fairfield, CT, burned by British July 11: Norwalk, CT, burned by British July 15-16: American "Mad" Anthony Wayne captures Stony Point, NY Aug. 19: Henry "Light Horse Harry" Lee attacks Paulus Hook, NJ Aug. 29: Newtown, NY, after two massacres, American forces burn Indian villages Sept. 23: John Paul Jones, aboard the Bonhomme Richard, captures British man-of-war Serapis near English coast
Oct. 9: American attempt to recapture Savannah, GA fails Nov.-June 23, 1780: Washington's 2nd winter at Morristown, NJ (the harshest winter of the 18th century)

May 12: British capture Charleston, SC May 29: British crush Americans at Waxhaw Creek, SC June 20: Patriots rout Tories at Ramseur's Mill, NC July 11: French troops arrive at Newport, RI, to aid the American cause Aug. 6: Patriots defeat Tories at Hanging Rock, SC Aug. 16: British rout Americans at Camden, SC Sept. 23: John André arrested, leading to the exposure of Benedict Arnold's plans to cede West Point to the British Oct. 7: King's Mountain, SC: battle lasts 65 minutes. American troops led by Isaac Shelby and John Sevier defeat Major Patrick Ferguson and one third of General Cornwallis's army Oct. 14: Washington names Nathanael Greene commander of the Southern Army

Jan. 1: Mutiny of unpaid Pennsylvania soldiers Jan. 17: American General Daniel Morgan overwhelmingly defeats British Colonel Tarleton at Cowpens, SC Feb. 1: The Battle of Cowan's Ford, Huntersville, NC March 2: Articles of Confederation adopted March 15: British win costly victory at Guilford Courthouse, NC April 25: Greene defeated at Hobkirk's Hill, SC May 15: British Major Andrew Maxwell cedes Fort Granby, SC to Lieutenant Colonel Henry Lee June 6: Americans recapture Augusta, GA June 18: British hold off Americans at Ninety Six, SC July 6: "Mad" Anthony Wayne repulsed at Green Springs Farm, VA Sept. 8: Greene defeated at Eutaw Springs, SC Sept. 15: French fleet drives British naval force from Chesapeake Bay Oct. 19: Cornwallis surrounded on land and sea by Americans and French and surrenders at Yorktown, VA

March 8: Gnadenhutten massacre, a.k.a. the Moravian massacre.
March 20: Lord North resigns as British prime minister July 11: British evacuate Savannah, GA Nov. 30: British and Americans sign preliminary Articles of Peace Dec. 14: British leave Charleston, SC

April 19: Congress ratifies preliminary peace treaty Sept. 3: The United States and Great Britain sign the Treaty of Paris Nov. 25: British troops leave New York City Dec. 23: Washington resigns as Commander

Sept. 17: U.S. Constitution signed

June 21: U.S. Constitution adopted, when New Hampshire ratifies it

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The French and Indian War June 19-July 11: The Albany Congress Oct. 7: Proclamation of 1763 April 5: The Sugar Act September 1: The Currency Act March 22: The Stamp Act March 24: The Quartering Act of 1765 May 29: Patrick Henry's "If this be treason, make the most of it!"

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African Americans and the Revolutionary War

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African Americans and the Revolutionary War

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Read to see the important role African Americans played in the Revolutionary War

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By Edward Ayres
Historian, American Revolution Museum at Yorktown

Only 50 years after the defeat of the British at Yorktown, most Americans had already forgotten the extensive role black people had played on both sides during the War for Independence. At the 1876 Centennial Celebration of the Revolution in Philadelphia, not a single speaker acknowledged the contributions of African Americans in establishing the nation. Yet by 1783, thousands of black Americans had become involved in the war. Many were active participants, some won their freedom and others were victims, but throughout the struggle blacks refused to be mere bystanders and gave their loyalty to the side that seemed to offer the best prospect for freedom.

By 1775 more than a half-million African Americans, most of them enslaved, were living in the 13 colonies. Early in the 18th century a few New England ministers and conscientious Quakers, such as George Keith and John Woolman, had questioned the morality of slavery but they were largely ignored. By the 1760s, however, as the colonists began to speak out against British tyranny, more Americans pointed out the obvious contradiction between advocating liberty and owning slaves. In 1774 Abigail Adams wrote, "it always appeared a most iniquitious scheme to me to fight ourselves for what we are daily robbing and plundering from those who have as good a right to freedom as we have."

Widespread talk of liberty gave thousands of slaves high expectations, and many were ready to fight for a democratic revolution that might offer them freedom. In 1775 at least 10 to 15 black soldiers, including some slaves, fought against the British at the battles of Lexington and Bunker Hill. Two of these men, Salem Poor and Peter Salem, earned special distinction for their bravery. By 1776, however, it had become clear that the revolutionary rhetoric of the founding fathers did not include enslaved blacks. The Declaration of Independence promised liberty for all men but failed to put an end to slavery; and although they had proved themselves in battle, the Continental Congress adopted a policy of excluding black soldiers from the army.

In spite of these discouragements, many free and enslaved African Americans in New England were willing to take up arms against the British. As soon states found it increasingly difficult to fill their enlistment quotas, they began to turn to this untapped pool of manpower. Eventually every state above the Potomac River recruited slaves for military service, usually in exchange for their freedom. By the end of the war from 5,000 to 8,000 blacks had served the American cause in some capacity, either on the battlefield, behind the lines in noncombatant roles, or on the seas. By 1777 some states began enacting laws that encouraged white owners to give slaves for the army in return for their enlistment bounty, or allowing masters to use slaves as substitutes when they or their sons were drafted. In the South the idea of arming slaves for military service met with such opposition that only free blacks were normally allowed to enlist in the army.

Most black soldiers were scattered throughout the Continental Army in integrated infantry regiments, where they were often assigned to support roles as wagoners, cooks, waiters or artisans. Several all-black units, commanded by white officers, also were formed and saw action against the British. Rhode Island's Black Battalion was established in 1778 when that state was unable to meet its quota for the Continental Army. The legislature agreed to set free slaves who volunteered for the duration of the war, and compensated their owners for their value. This regiment performed bravely throughout the war and was present at Yorktown where an observer noted it was "the most neatly dressed, the best under arms, and the most precise in its maneuvers."

Although the Southern states were reluctant to recruit enslaved African Americans for the army, they had no objections to using free and enslaved blacks as pilots and able-bodied seaman. In Virginia alone, as many as 150 black men, many of them slaves, served in the state navy. After the war, the legislature granted several of these men their freedom as a reward for faithful service. African Americans also served as gunners, sailors on privateers and in the Continental Navy during the Revolution. While the majority of blacks who contributed to the struggle for independence performed routine jobs, a few, such as James Lafayette, gained renown serving as spies or orderlies for well-known military leaders.

Black participation in the Revolution, however, was not limited to supporting the American cause, and either voluntarily or under duress thousands also fought for the British. Enslaved blacks made their own assessment of the conflict and supported the side that offered the best opportunity to escape bondage. Most British officials were reluctant to arm blacks, but as early as 1775, Virginia's royal governor, Lord Dunmore, established an all-black "Ethiopian Regiment" composed of runaway slaves. By promising them freedom, Dunmore enticed over 800 slaves to escape from "rebel" masters. Whenever they could, enslaved blacks continued to join him until he was defeated and forced to leave Virginia in 1776. Dunmore's innovative strategy met with disfavor in England, but to many blacks the British army came to represent liberation.

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African Americans and the American Revolution - History Is Fun

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By Edward Ayres Historian, American Revolution Museum at Yorktown Only 50 years after the defeat of the British at Yorktown, most Americans had already forgotten the extensive role black people had played on both sides during the War for Independence. At the 1876 Centennial Celebration of the Revolution in Philadelphia, not a single speaker acknowledged [...]

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During the American Revolution, thousands of Black Americans jumped into the war, on both sides of the conflict. But unlike their white counterparts, they weren't just fighting for independence-or to maintain British control. In a time when the vast majority of African Americans lived in bondage-their forced labor fueling the economy of the fledgling nation-most took up arms hoping to be freed from the literal shackles of chattel slavery. In fact, when enslaved people had choice in the matter, according to historian Edward Ayres of the American Revolution Museum in Yorktown, Virginia, they signed on with whichever side seemed most likely to grant them personal freedom.

For some slaves-turned-soldiers, the Revolution's promise of liberty became a reality. But despite the patriots' lofty rhetoric about liberty and justice for all, America's war for independence didn't herald widespread emancipation for enslaved people of color. America's northern states didn't pass laws to abolish slavery until 1804-and even then, some areas phased it out slowly. Southern states would cling to the brutal practice for more than a half-century longer.

Historians estimate that between 5,000 and 8,000 African-descended people participated in the Revolution on the Patriot side, and that upward of 20,000 served the crown. Many fought with extraordinary bravery and skill, their exploits lost to our collective memory. Below are the stories of several exceptional African American figures-a martyr, a poet and a double agent among them-whose crucial contributions to the conflict have been remembered to history.

Crispus Attucks, Martyr

Crispus Attucks, whom many historians credit as the first man to die for the rebellion, became a symbol of Black American patriotism and sacrifice. In 1770, as tension mounted between British and colonial sailors in Massachusetts ports, distrust and competition among them grew. These pressures came to a head on March 5th, when an angry confrontation turned into a slaughter known as the Boston Massacre.

Witnesses say that Attucks, a middle-aged runaway enslaved man of African and native American descent, who worked as a sailor and a rope maker, played an active role in the initial scuffle. Of the five colonists killed, he was said to be the first to fall-making him the first martyr to the American cause. He was taken down by two musket balls to the chest.

Salem Poor, Patriot Soldier

Salem Poor began life as a Massachusetts slave and ended it as an American hero. Born into bondage in the late 1740s, he purchased his own freedom two decades later for 27 pounds, the equivalent of a few thousand dollars today. Soon after, Poor joined the fight for independence.

Enlisting multiple times, he is believed to have fought in the battles of Saratoga and Monmouth. He's most famous, however, for his heroism at the Battle of Bunker Hill -where his contributions so impressed fellow soldiers, that after the war ended, 14 of them formally recognized his excellent battle skills with a petition to the General Court of Massachusetts. In it, they called him out as a "brave and gallant soldier," saying he "behaved like an experienced officer." Poor is credited in that battle with killing British Lieutenant Colonel James Abercrombie, along with several other enemy soldiers.

Colonel Tye, Loyalist Guerrilla

Colonel Tye earned a reputation as the most formidable guerilla leader in the Revolutionary War. During his years fighting for the British, Patriots feared his raids, while their slaves welcomed his help in their liberation.

Tye, originally known as Titus during his early years in slavery in New Jersey, escaped a particularly brutal master in 1775 and joined the British army after the Crown offered freedom to any enslaved person who enlisted. While Tye stood out as a soldier from the start, the British didn't station him at pitched battles. They saw more value in using his knowledge of the coveted New Jersey territory, which sat between British-occupied New York and the Patriot's center of government in Philadelphia. The Redcoats needed to take this middle land-and believed Tye could help.

The British were right. Tye excelled at raid warfare there. His familiarity with the area gave him an advantage in attacks on Patriots' lands. And his daring, skillful execution kept his Black Brigade soldiers largely unscathed as they plundered homes, took supplies, freed slaves and sometimes even assassinated Patriot slaveholders renowned for their cruelty. The British recognized Tye's impact on their success and, out of respect for all his contributions, bestowed on him the honorific title of Colonel. He remains an important symbol of fearless resistance.

The First Rhode Island Regiment, Integrated Revolutionary Force

The First Rhode Island Regiment, the first Continental Army unit largely comprised of Black New Englanders, showcased African Americans' skill as soldiers and commitment to their brethren on the battlefield. In the late 1770s, dwindling manpower forced George Washington to reconsider his original decision to ban Black people from the Continental Army. So in 1778, a Rhode Island legislature declared that both free and enslaved Black people could serve. To attract the latter, the Patriots promised freedom at the end of service.

Though relatively small-only about 130 men-the First Rhode Island Regiment had an outsized impact. Commanding General John Sullivan praised its soldiers for their success against attacks in the Battle of Newport, saying they displayed "desperate valor in repelling three furious Hessian (German) infantry assaults." When the Rhode Islanders journeyed to Virginia, where several thousand other soldiers were assembling, they stood out, according to aFrench military officer there, as "most neatly dressed, the best under arms and the most precise in all their maneuvers."

And one early historian, William Cooper, lauded their fierce loyalty. When their commander Colonel Christopher Greene was cut down during a surprise early-morning attack in May 1781, he wrote, "the sabers of the enemy only reached him through the bodies of his faithful guard of blacks, who hovered over him to protect him, and every one of whom was killed."

Phyllis Wheatley, Patriot Poet

Phillis Wheatley was a revolutionary intellectual who waged a war for freedom with her words. Captured as a child in West Africa, then taken to North America and enslaved, Wheatley had an unusual experience in bondage: Her owners educated her and supported her literary pursuits. In 1773, at around age 20, Wheatley became the first African American and third woman to publish a book of poetry in the young nation. Shortly after, her owners freed her.

Influential colonists read Wheatley's poems and lauded her talent. Her work, which reflected her close knowledge of the ancient classics as well as Biblical theology, carried strong messages against slavery and became a rallying cry for Abolitionists: "Remember, Christians, Negroes, black as Cain, /May be refin'd and join th' angelic train." She also advocated for independence, artfully expressing support for George Washington's Revolutionary War in her poem, "To His Excellency, General Washington." Washington, who himself had been forced to end his formal education at age 11, appreciated Wheatley's support and extolled her talent. The commander even invited her to meet, explaining he would "be happy to see a person so favored by the Muses."

Peter Salem, Colonial Hero

Peter Salem is best known for his crucial contributions at the outset of the Revolution. Born into slavery in Massachusetts in the mid-18th century, Salem joined the Patriots in the earliest battles of the war, participating as a "minute man" at Lexington and Concord. His owners supported this decision and freed him so that he could remain enlisted.

Salem earned his place in history for his role in one the most important Revolutionary War fights, the 1775 Battle of Bunker Hill. Although the British defeated the Continental Army in this encounter, it wasn't a total loss for the Patriots: Their killing of many Redcoats encouraged them to keep up the fight. Many historians credit Salem with killing a key officer of the crown, Major John Pitcairn, just as he was scaling the top of the American redoubt and demanding that the Patriots surrender. Salem's role is believed to have been memorialized in John Trumbull's painting The battle of Bunker's Hill.

James Armistead Lafayette, the Double Agent

During the Revolution, James Armistead's life changed drastically-from an enslaved person in Virginia to a double agent passing intel, and misinformation, between the two warring sides. When Armistead joined the Patriots' efforts, they assigned him to infiltrate the enemy. So he pretended to be a runaway slave wanting to serve the crown, and was welcomed by the British with open arms. At first they assigned him menial support tasks, but he soon became a more strategic resource due to his vast knowledge of the local terrain. Armistead's role got more interesting when the British directed him to spy on the Patriots. Since his loyalty remained with the colonists, he claimed to be bringing the British intel about the Continental Army, but he was actually pushing incorrect information to foil their plans. In the meantime, he was learning details of the British battle plans, which he brought back to his commander, General Marquis de Lafayette.

This served the Americans well. Because of Armistead's efforts, they got the insight they needed to successfully execute the decisive Siege of Yorktown, which effectively ended the war. Years later, after a testimonial from the French general helped secure Armistead's freedom, the former slave changed his surname to Lafayette.

HISTORY Vault: The American Revolution

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African Americans in the Revolutionary War

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How the Proclamation of 1763 Sparked the Revolution

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How the Proclamation of 1763 Sparked the Revolution

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The Proclamation of 1763 is a statement King George made after the French and Indian War that didn't allow the colonists to move west from where they lived, even though the colonists fought with the British in the French and Indian War.

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Great Britain's victory over France in the Seven Years' War, also known as the French and Indian War, gave it control over all of eastern North America. Most native tribes had allied with the French during the conflict, and they soon found themselves dissatisfied by British rule. In May 1763, just a few months after the formal conclusion of the Seven Years' War, a pan-tribal confederacy led by Ottawa chief Pontiac rose up in rebellion. His warriors attacked a dozen British forts, capturing eight of them, and raided numerous frontier settlements. Hundreds died in the process. In response, the British handed out smallpox-infected blankets to Pontiac's followers. Moreover, a gang of whites known as the Paxton Boys massacred 20 defenseless Native Americans who had nothing to do with the fighting.

In an attempt to prevent similar incidents from occurring, King George III issued a royal proclamation on October 7, 1763, which established three new mainland colonies (Quebec, West Florida and East Florida), extended Georgia's southern border and gave land to soldiers who had fought in the Seven Years' War. More notably, it banned colonial settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains, at least "for the present, and until our further pleasure be known." Those colonists already there were ordered to relocate. Acknowledging that "great frauds and abuses have been committed," the proclamation furthermore prohibited individuals from buying tribal territory. Instead, only the crown could now make such purchases. "We shall avoid many future quarrels with the savages by this salutary measure," said General Thomas Gage, who commanded all British forces in North America.

The British made a perfunctory effort to enforce the proclamation, periodically stopping settlers as they headed west and forcibly removing others. On one occasion, redcoats from Fort Pitt in present-day Pittsburgh even burned the huts of some nearby pioneers and escorted them back across the boundary. For the most part, though, colonists disregarded the proclamation without fear of punishment. Some wanted only enough land for themselves and their families, whereas others were speculators looking to make a hefty profit down the road. George Washington, for one, wrote to his agent in 1767 in support of illegally buying as much Native American land as possible. The Proclamation of 1763 will soon be revoked, Washington explained, because-"this I say between ourselves"-it was only meant "as a temporary expedient to quiet the minds of the Indians." Other famous speculators included Patrick Henry, best known for his "Give me liberty or give me death" speech, and Henry Laurens, who later served as president of the Continental Congress.

Washington's prediction proved prescient the following year, when the British moved the boundary line westward as part of the Treaty of Fort Stanwix. Under the deal, the Iroquois agreed to give up parts of present-day New York, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia in exchange for cash, gifts and the (soon-to-be-broken) promise of a permanent border. But although the Iroquois claimed those lands, they did not live there. The tribes that did, such as the Shawnee, were infuriated, and ended up going to war with the British in 1774. Meanwhile, further south, the Cherokee surrendered tens of thousands of square miles in a series of treaties. Also losing territory were the Creeks, who purportedly referred to the colonists as Ecunnaunuxulgee, or "People greedily grasping after the lands of the red people."

Ultimately, the new acquisitions failed to quiet colonial discontent with the Proclamation of 1763. And though it would be later overshadowed by other complaints against the British, such as the Sugar Act, the Stamp Act, the Townshend Acts, the so-called Intolerable Acts and the Boston Massacre, it remained enough of a concern that the Declaration of Independence criticized King George III for "raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands." By winning their freedom from the British in 1783, the Americans rendered the proclamation moot. But it has lived on to this day in Canada, where it forms the legal basis for native land rights. "We must recall the intent that brought all our ancestors together so many years ago," Shawn A-in-chut Atleo, national chief of Canada's Assembly of First Nations, said earlier today at a 250th anniversary event, "and ensure that [we live up] to the promises in the treaties and other agreements that stem from the foundation of the royal proclamation."

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Great Britain's victory over France in the Seven Years' War, also known as the French and Indian War, gave it control over all of eastern North America. Most native tribes had allied with the French during the conflict, and they soon found themselves dissatisfied by British rule.

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5 Ways the French Helped with the American Revolution

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5 Ways the French Helped with the American Revolution

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France was a big help to the colonists during the American Revolution. To this day, that connection to France remains strong. Read to find out how France helped the colonists.

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How crucial were the French to helping colonists win the American Revolution?

An iconic oil painting of the British surrender at Yorktown, now hanging in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda, perfectly captures the partnership. As the grim, resigned British general at the picture's center prepares to hand over his sword, he is flanked on one side by an array of Americans, underneath a waving Stars and Stripes flag-and on the other by French officers and volunteers, beneath the white and gold banner of France's Bourbon monarchs.

Artist John Trumbull's decision to portray the two forces as equal combatants against the British signals how much America's founding fathers owed to the French in their battle for independence. The decision by Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier (better known as the Marquis de Lafayette) to leave France and enlist with George Washington 's forces is well-known to many. But Lafayette was only a prelude to massive French support, the forerunner of a deep relationship that proved vital to the revolution's success. Here are five ways the French helped Americans win their freedom.

1. They provided ideological underpinnings.

"Give me liberty or give me death!" Patrick Henry's forceful declaration to the Second Virginia Convention in March 1775, proved a tipping point, convincing his fellow delegates-including George Washington and Thomas Jefferson-to vote in favor of committing Virginian troops to the looming revolutionary battle. Henry's rhetoric echoed the writings of French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who opened his influential 1762 work, The Social Contract, with the words "Man is born free and everywhere he is in chains."

By the 1760s, the founding fathers and their peers eagerly devoured French political philosophy. "It became almost a patriotic duty for colonists to admire France as a counterpoise to an increasingly hostile England," wrote historian Lawrence Kaplan of Kent State University. The British may have triumphed militarily over their French rivals in the global conflict known as the Seven Years' War. But America's future founders disparaged the way the British (in their eyes) trampled on their own constitution, turning instead to France for new ideas about freedom and independence.

Rousseau, for one, spoke of sovereignty residing not in a monarch, but in the people as a group, and of the need to craft laws for the general good. Thomas Jefferson's rhetoric (including "All men are created equal") owed much to Rousseau. However, the drafters of the U.S. Constitution may have been most inspired by the Baron de Montesquieu, who argued in his treatise The Spirit of the Laws that avoiding despotism required a government of checks and balances.

Without the ideas of these French philosophers to inspire them in tough times, it's hard to imagine the revolution succeeding.

2. They posed a heftier geopolitical threat to Britain.

Still smarting from its defeat in the Seven Years' War and loss of colonies worldwide, including much of Canada, France saw America's rebellion as an opportunity for revenge-and to re-establish part of its own empire at British expense. The wily Comte de Vergennes, France's foreign minister, urged Louis XVI to support the Americans, arguing that "providence had marked out this moment for the humiliation of England."

French participation transformed what might otherwise have been a lopsided colonial rebellion into a significant war, with potential to become another global conflict. The British, it turned out, had little appetite for this-especially when other European powers such as Spain and the Dutch Republic proved willing to support the colonists. The geopolitical calculus made it difficult for British legislators to accept the prospect of a prolonged, costly and global battle.

3. They provided covert aid.

One evening in December 1775, Benjamin Franklin, a delegate to the Second Continental Congress-and a member of its Committee of Secret Correspondence, which conducted foreign communications-slipped silently into Philadelphia's Carpenters' Hall along with four of his colleagues to commit what the British would certainly view as treason. They had come to meet Julien-Alexandre de Bonvouloir, a secret envoy from the French regime. The clandestine meeting sowed the seeds of a strong covert relationship between the revolutionaries and France that predated the formal 1778 treaties between the two.

Bonvouloir's reports back to France were enthusiastic. "Everyone here is a soldier," he said of the colonies. Franklin's team of negotiators sent Silas Deane to Paris under the guise of a merchant looking for goods to buy for resale to Native Americans. Deane's real quest was very different: He sought military engineers, along with clothing, arms and ammunition for 25,000 soldiers. Oh, and credit from the French to pay for it all. Within two weeks of arriving, he had what he wanted, and France had become a secret supporter of the revolution.

When Benjamin Franklin himself traveled to Paris in November 1776, much of the secrecy surrounding the negotiations with France fell away. But Franklin's popularity with everyone from the aristocracy (he encouraged Lafayette to volunteer) to the general public put more pressure on the French regime to keep supporting their new allies-even amid reports of American losses and their dreadful winter at Valley Forge.

Great ideas can wither and die without the capital to support them. And from the earliest days, America's uprising depended on French willingness to provide open-ended credit that enabled Deane and his partners to ship supplies to the beleaguered revolutionary forces. Ultimately, France provided about 1.3 billion livres of desperately-needed money and goods to support the rebels. Estimates suggest that at the colonists' October 1777 victory at Saratoga, a turning point in the war, 90 percent of all American troops carried French arms, and they were completely dependent on French gunpowder.

That triumph prompted the French to open their coffers wider. Once the relationship was formalized in twin agreements early in 1778 (the Treaty of Alliance and the Treaty of Amity and Commerce), the flow of supplies soared, along with the numbers of soldiers and sailors crossing the Atlantic to fight for the American cause.

Roughly 12,000 French soldiers served the rebellion, along with some 22,000 naval personnel, aboard 63 warships. Lafayette was the one of the earliest-and most prominent -officers to join. The comte de Rochambeau, commander in chief of all French forces, played a crucial role in containing the English fleet and in the final campaigns. The comte de Grasse reinforced revolutionary forces in Virginia with French troops from Saint-Domingue (now Haiti) in the Caribbean, then dealt Britain's navy a decisive defeat at the 1781 Battle of the Chesapeake. It would be an army led by Washington, Lafayette and Rochambeau together that struck the decisive blow at Yorktown.

5. They gave the upstart colonists political legitimacy.

Without France's aid, American revolutionaries might have been seen by other major powers merely as treasonous subjects rebelling against their rulers. French willingness to negotiate with Deane, Franklin and their successors conferred legitimacy on American leaders. The Treaty of Amity and Commerce of 1778 formally acknowledged the United States as an independent nation and opened the way for Americans to continue trading internationally. Over time, France also enlisted the aid of other major European powers (Spain allied itself with the United States in 1779) while sidelining others, like Austria, which never joined the war but made clear it would back France in any wider conflict.

Following the Yorktown surrender, France's diplomatic support (and yet another loan) proved critical in reaching a formal end to the conflict, with the 1783 Treaty of Paris. Both the French and the Americans refused British offers of separate peace agreements, and French foreign minister Vergennes took a key role in brokering the treaty. Ultimately, it wasn't until Britain and France settled their differences that the Americans finally signed the Treaty of Paris.

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5 Ways the French Helped Win the American Revolution | HISTORY

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The Marquis de Lafayette was only the beginning.

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African Americans and the American Revolution

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African Americans and the American Revolution

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Lexington From Both Points of View-Excerpt from The Split History of the American Revolution by Burgan

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Lexington From Both Points of View-Excerpt from The Split History of the American Revolution by Burgan

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Click view post and then you can rotate the text to read about Lexington from the British viewpoint and then the Patriots viewpoint.

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Lexington excerpt from Split History of the Amer. Revolution

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Thomas Jefferson's Thoughts on the Declaration of Independence

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Thomas Jefferson's Thoughts on the Declaration of Independence

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Nothing of particular excitement occurring for a considerable time our countrymen seemed to fall into a state of insensibility to our situation. The duty on tea not yet repealed & the Declaratory act of a right in the British parliament to bind us by their laws in all cases whatsoever, still suspended over us. But a court of inquiry held in R. Island in 1772 [*see note in commentary following], with a power to send persons to England to be tried for offences committed here was considered at our session of the spring of 1773 as demanding attention. Not thinking our old & leading members up to the point of forwardness & zeal which the times required, Mr. Henry, R. H. Lee, Francis L. Lee, Mr. Carr & myself agreed to meet in the evening in a private room [the Apollo room, pictured below] of the Raleigh to consult on the state of things.

There may have been a member or two more whom I do not recollect. We were all sensible that the most urgent of all measures was that of coming to an understanding with all the other colonies to consider the British claims as a common cause to all, & to produce an unity of action: and for this purpose that a committee of correspondence in each colony would be the best instrument for intercommunication: and that their first measure would probably be to propose a meeting of deputies from every colony at some central place, who should be charged with the direction of the measures which should be taken by all.

We therefore drew up the resolutions which may be seen in Wirt pa 87. The consulting members proposed to me to move them, but I urged that it should be done by Mr. Carr, my friend & brother in law, then a new member to whom I wished an opportunity should be given of making known to the house his great worth & talents. It was so agreed; he moved them, they were agreed to nem. con. and a committee of correspondence appointed of whom Peyton Randolph, the Speaker, was chairman.

The Govr. (then Ld. Dunmore) dissolved us, but the committee met the next day, prepared a circular letter to the Speakers of the other colonies, inclosing to each a copy of the resolutions and left it in charge with their chairman to forward them by expresses.

The next event which excited our sympathies for Massachusetts was the Boston port bill, by which that port was to be shut up on the 1st of June, 1774. This arrived while we were in session in the spring of that year. The lead in the house on these subjects being no longer left to the old members, Mr. Henry, R. H. Lee, Fr. L. Lee, 3 or 4 other members, whom I do not recollect, and myself, agreeing that we must boldly take an unequivocal stand in the line with Massachusetts, determined to meet and consult on the proper measures in the council chamber, for the benefit of the library in that room. We were under conviction of the necessity of arousing our people from the lethargy into which they had fallen as to passing events; and thought that the appointment of a day of general fasting & prayer would be most likely to call up & alarm their attention. No example of such a solemnity had existed since the days of our distresses in the war of '55, since which a new generation had grown up. With the help therefore of Rushworth, [a popular book, John Rushworth's Historical Collections] whom we rummaged over for the revolutionary precedents & forms of the Puritans of that day, preserved by him, we cooked up a resolution, somewhat modernizing their phrases, for appointing the 1st day of June, on which the Port bill was to commence, for a day of fasting, humiliation & prayer, to implore heaven to avert from us the evils of civil war, to inspire us with firmness in support of our rights, and to turn the hearts of the King & parliament to moderation & justice. To give greater emphasis to our proposition, we agreed to wait the next morning on Mr. Nicholas, whose grave & religious character was more in unison with the tone of our resolution and to solicit him to move it. We accordingly went to him in the morning. He moved it the same day; the 1st of June was proposed and it passed without opposition. The Governor dissolved us as usual.

We retired to the Apollo as before, agreed to an association, [see comments above] and instructed the committee of correspondence to propose to the corresponding committees of the other colonies to appoint deputies to meet in Congress at such place, annually, as should be convenient to direct, from time to time, the measures required by the general interest: and we declared that an attack on any one colony should be considered as an attack on the whole. This was in May. We further recommended to the several counties to elect deputies to meet at Williamsburg the 1st of August ensuing, to consider the state of the colony, & particularly to appoint delegates to a general Congress, should that measure be acceded to by the committees of correspondence generally. It was acceded to, Philadelphia was appointed for the place, and the 5th of September for the time of meeting. We returned home, and in our several counties invited the clergy to meet assemblies of the people on the 1st of June, to perform the ceremonies of the day, & to address to them discourses suited to the occasion.

The people met generally, with anxiety & alarm in their countenances, and the effect of the day thro' the whole colony was like a shock of electricity, arousing every man & placing him erect & solidly on his centre. They chose universally delegates for the convention.

Being elected one for my own county I prepared a draught of instructions [see comments above] to be given to the delegates whom we should send to the Congress, and which I meant to propose at our meeting. In this I took the ground which, from the beginning I had thought the only one orthodox or tenable, which was that the relation between Gr. Br. and these colonies was exactly the same as that of England & Scotland after the accession of James & until the Union, and the same as her present relations with Hanover, having the same Executive chief but no other necessary political connection; and that our emigration from England to this country gave her no more rights over us, than the emigrations of the Danes and Saxons gave to the present authorities of the mother country over England. In this doctrine however I had never been able to get any one to agree with me but Mr. Wythe. He concurred in it from the first dawn of the question What was the political relation between us & England? Our other patriots Randolph, the Lees [F.L. Lee, R.H. Lee], Nicholas, Pendleton stopped at the half-way house of John Dickinson who admitted that England had a right to regulate our commerce, and to lay duties on it for the purposes of regulation, but not of raising revenue. But for this ground there was no foundation in compact, in any acknowledged principles of colonization, nor in reason: expatriation being a natural right, and acted on as such, by all nations, in all ages. I set out for Williamsburg some days before that appointed for our meeting, but was taken ill of a dysentery on the road, & unable to proceed. I sent on therefore to Williamsburg two copies of my draught, the one under cover to Peyton Randolph, who I knew would be in the chair of the convention, the other to Patrick Henry. Whether Mr. Henry disapproved the ground taken, or was too lazy to read it (for he was the laziest man in reading I ever knew) I never learned: but he communicated it to nobody. Peyton Randolph informed the convention he had received such a paper from a member prevented by sickness from offering it in his place, and he laid it on the table for perusal. It was read generally by the members, approved by many, but thought too bold for the present state of things; but they printed it in pamphlet form under the title of "A Summary view of the rights of British America." It found its way to England, was taken up by the opposition, interpolated a little by Mr. Burke so as to make it answer opposition purposes, and in that form ran rapidly thro' several editions. This information I had from Parson Hurt, who happened at the time to be in London, whether he had gone to receive clerical orders. And I was informed afterwards by Peyton Randolph that it had procured me the honor of having my name inserted in a long list of proscriptions enrolled in a bill of attainder commenced in one of the houses of parliament, but suppressed in embryo by the hasty step of events which warned them to be a little cautious. Montague, agent of the House of Burgesses in England made extracts from the bill, copied the names, and sent them to Peyton Randolph. The names I think were about 20 which he repeated to me, but I recollect those only of Hancock, the two Adamses [John, Samuel], Peyton Randolph himself, Patrick Henry, & myself. ¹

The convention met on the 1st of August, renewed their association, appointed delegates to the Congress, gave them instructions very temperately & properly expressed, both as to style & matter; and they repaired to Philadelphia at the time appointed.

The splendid proceedings of that Congress at their 1st session belong to general history, are known to every one, and need not therefore be noted here. They terminated their session on the 26th of October, to meet again on the 10th May ensuing. The convention at their ensuing session of Mar, '75, approved of the proceedings of Congress, thanked their delegates and reappointed the same persons to represent the colony at the meeting to be held in May: and foreseeing the probability that Peyton Randolph their president and Speaker also of the House of Burgesses might be called off, they added me, in that event to the delegation.

Footnotes
1 See Girardin's History of Virginia, Appendix No. 12, note.

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Declaration of Independence: Thomas Jefferson's Account

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Nothing of particular excitement occurring for a considerable time our countrymen seemed to fall into a state of insensibility to our situation. The duty on tea not yet repealed & the Declaratory act of a right in the British parliament to bind us by their laws in all cases whatsoever, still suspended over us.

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Paul Revere's Account of His Famous Ride

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Paul Revere's Account of His Famous Ride

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I, PAUL REVERE, of Boston, in the colony of the Massachusetts Bay in New England; of lawful age, do testify and say; that I was sent for by Dr. Joseph Warren, of said Boston, on the evening of the 18th of April, about 10 o'clock; when he desired me, ''to go to Lexington, and inform Mr. Samuel Adams, and the Hon. John Hancock Esq. that there was a number of soldiers, composed of light troops, and grenadiers, marching to the bottom of the common, where there was a number of boats to receive them; it was supposed that they were going to Lexington, by the way of Cambridge River, to take them, or go to Concord, to destroy the colony stores.''

I proceeded immediately, and was put across Charles River and landed near Charlestown Battery; went in town, and there got a horse. While in Charlestown, I was informed by Richard Devens Esq. that he met that evening, after sunset, nine officers of the ministerial army, mounted on good horses, and armed, going towards Concord.

I set off, it was then about 11 o'clock, the moon shone bright. I had got almost over Charlestown Common, towards Cambridge, when I saw two officers on horse-back, standing under the shade of a tree, in a narrow part of the road. I was near enough to see their holsters and cockades. One of them started his horse towards me, the other up the road, as I supposed, to head me, should I escape the first. I turned my horse short about, and rode upon a full gallop for Mistick Road. He followed me about 300 yards, and finding he could not catch me, returned. I proceeded to Lexington, through Mistick, and alarmed Mr. Adams and Col. Hancock.

After I had been there about half an hour Mr. Daws arrived, who came from Boston, over the Neck.

We set off for Concord, and were overtaken by a young gentleman named Prescot, who belonged to Concord, and was going home. When we had got about half way from Lexington to Concord, the other two stopped at a house to awake the men, I kept along. When I had got about 200 yards ahead of them, I saw two officers as before. I called to my company to come up, saying here was two of them, (for I had told them what Mr. Devens told me, and of my being stopped). In an instant I saw four of them, who rode up to me with their pistols in their bands, said ''G---d d---n you, stop. If you go an inch further, you are a dead man.'' Immediately Mr. Prescot came up. We attempted to get through them, but they kept before us, and swore if we did not turn in to that pasture, they would blow our brains out, (they had placed themselves opposite to a pair of bars, and had taken the bars down). They forced us in. When we had got in, Mr. Prescot said ''Put on!'' He took to the left, I to the right towards a wood at the bottom of the pasture, intending, when I gained that, to jump my horse and run afoot. Just as I reached it, out started six officers, seized my bridle, put their pistols to my breast, ordered me to dismount, which I did. One of them, who appeared to have the command there, and much of a gentleman, asked me where I came from; I told him. He asked what time I left . I told him, he seemed surprised, said ''Sir, may I crave your name?'' I answered ''My name is Revere. ''What'' said he, ''Paul Revere''? I answered ''Yes.'' The others abused much; but he told me not to be afraid, no one should hurt me. I told him they would miss their aim. He said they should not, they were only waiting for some deserters they expected down the road. I told him I knew better, I knew what they were after; that I had alarmed the country all the way up, that their boats were caught aground, and I should have 500 men there soon. One of them said they had 1500 coming; he seemed surprised and rode off into the road, and informed them who took me, they came down immediately on a full gallop. One of them (whom I since learned was Major Mitchel of the 5th Reg.) clapped his pistol to my head, and said he was going to ask me some questions, and if I did not tell the truth, he would blow my brains out. I told him I esteemed myself a man of truth, that he had stopped me on the highway, and made me a prisoner, I knew not by what right; I would tell him the truth; I was not afraid. He then asked me the same questions that the other did, and many more, but was more particular; I gave him much the same answers. He then ordered me to mount my horse, they first searched me for pistols. When I was mounted, the Major took the reins out of my hand, and said ''By G---d Sir, you are not to ride with reins I assure you''; and gave them to an officer on my right, to lead me. He then ordered 4 men out of the bushes, and to mount their horses; they were country men which they had stopped who were going home; then ordered us to march. He said to me, ''We are now going towards your friends, and if you attempt to run, or we are insulted, we will blow your brains out.'' When we had got into the road they formed a circle, and ordered the prisoners in the center, and to lead me in the front. We rode towards Lexington at a quick pace; they very often insulted me calling me rebel, etc., etc. After we had got about a mile, I was given to the sergeant to lead, he was ordered to take out his pistol, (he rode with a hanger,) and if I ran, to execute the major's sentence.

When we got within about half a mile of the Meeting House we heard a gun fired. The Major asked me what it was for, I told him to alarm the country; he ordered the four prisoners to dismount, they did, then one of the officers dismounted and cut the bridles and saddles off the horses, and drove them away, and told the men they might go about their business. I asked the Major to dismiss me, he said he would carry me, let the consequence be what it will. He then ordered us to march.

When we got within sight of the Meeting House, we heard a volley of guns fired, as I supposed at the tavern, as an alarm; the Major ordered us to halt, he asked me how far it was to Cambridge, and many more questions, which I answered. He then asked the sergeant, if his horse was tired, he said yes; he ordered him to take my horse. I dismounted, and the sergeant mounted my horse; they cut the bridle and saddle of the sergeant's horse, and rode off down the road. I then went to the house were I left Messrs. Adams and Hancock, and told them what had happened; their friends advised them to go out of the way; I went with them, about two miles across road.

After resting myself, I set off with another man to go back to the tavern, to inquire the news; when we got there, we were told the troops were within two miles. We went into the tavern to get a trunk of papers belonging to Col. Hancock. Before we left the house, I saw the ministerial troops from the chamber window. We made haste, and had to pass through our militia, who were on a green behind the Meeting House, to the number as I supposed, about 50 or 60, I went through them; as I passed I heard the commanding officer speak to his men to this purpose; ''Let the troops pass by, and don't molest them, without they begin first.'' I had to go across road; but had not got half gunshot off, when the ministerial troops appeared in sight, behind the Meeting House. They made a short halt, when one gun was fired. I heard the report, turned my head, and saw the smoke in front of the troops. They immediately gave a great shout, ran a few paces, and then the whole fired. I could first distinguish irregular firing, which I supposed was the advance guard, and then platoons; at this time I could not see our militia, for they were covered from me by a house at the bottom of the street.

s/PAUL REVERE.

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America's Homepage and the Virtual Tour of Washington, D.C.

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I, PAUL REVERE, of Boston, in the colony of the Massachusetts Bay in New England; of lawful age, do testify and say; that I was sent for by Dr. Joseph Warren, of said Boston, on the evening of the 18th of April, about 10 o'clock; when he desired me, ''to go to Lexington, and inform Mr. Samuel Adams, and the Hon.

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Paul Revere's famous ride, as well as the ride of his companions that same night.

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On April 18, 1775, British troops march out of Boston on a mission to confiscate the American arsenal at Concord and to capture Patriot leaders Samuel Adams and John Hancock, known to be hiding at Lexington. As the British departed, Boston Patriots Paul Revere and William Dawes set out on horseback from the city to warn Adams and Hancock and rouse the Minutemen.

By 1775, tensions between the American colonies and the British government had approached the breaking point, especially in Massachusetts, where Patriot leaders formed a shadow revolutionary government and trained militias to prepare for armed conflict with the British troops occupying Boston. In the spring of 1775, General Thomas Gage, the British governor of Massachusetts, received instructions from Great Britain to seize all stores of weapons and gunpowder accessible to the American insurgents. On April 18, he ordered British troops to march against Concord and Lexington.

The Boston Patriots had been preparing for such a British military action for some time, and, upon learning of the British plan, Revere and Dawes set off across the Massachusetts countryside. They took separate routes in case one of them was captured: Dawes left the city via the Boston Neck peninsula and Revere crossed the Charles River to Charlestown by boat. As the two couriers made their way, Patriots in Charlestown waited for a signal from Boston informing them of the British troop movement. As previously agreed, one lantern would be hung in the steeple of Boston's Old North Church, the highest point in the city, if the British were marching out of the city by Boston Neck, and two lanterns would be hung if they were crossing the Charles River to Cambridge. Two lanterns were hung, and the armed Patriots set out for Lexington and Concord accordingly. Along the way, Revere and Dawes roused hundreds of Minutemen, who armed themselves and set out to oppose the British.

Revere arrived in Lexington shortly before Dawes, but together they warned Adams and Hancock and then set out for Concord. Along the way, they were joined by Samuel Prescott, a young Patriot who had been riding home after visiting a lady friend. Early on the morning of April 19, a British patrol captured Revere, and Dawes lost his horse, forcing him to walk back to Lexington on foot. However, Prescott escaped and rode on to Concord to warn the Patriots there. After being roughly questioned for an hour or two, Revere was released when the patrol heard Minutemen alarm guns being fired on their approach to Lexington.

About 5 a.m. on April 19, 700 British troops under Major John Pitcairn arrived at the town to find a 77-man-strong colonial militia under Captain John Parker waiting for them on Lexington's common green. Pitcairn ordered the outnumbered Patriots to disperse, and after a moment's hesitation, the Americans began to drift off the green. Suddenly, the " shot heard around the world" was fired from an undetermined gun, and a cloud of musket smoke soon covered the green. When the brief Battle of Lexington ended, a handful of Americans lay dead and several others wounded. The American Revolution had begun.

HISTORY Vault: The American Revolution

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On April 18, 1775, British troops march out of Boston on a mission to confiscate the American arsenal at Concord and to capture Patriot leaders Samuel Adams and John Hancock, known to be hiding at Lexington. As the British departed, Boston Patriots Paul Revere and William Dawes set out on horseback from the city to [...]

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A list of some of the people who have shaped the history of the United States of America with links to more detailed biographical infomation

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Black Women's Contributions to the Revolutionary War

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Black Women's Contributions to the Revolutionary War

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The FIRST section ONLY is about the Revolutionary War. The other sections are not.

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Many visitors have requested information about the contributions of African American women to the military.

Revolutionary War

African-American women played major support roles during the Colonial period by providing help to the militia. Their assistance included roles such as moving into the "big house" to support the slaveowner's wife when he went away to serve in the militia, taking care of wounds, and working alongside the men in building forts for safety from both the Indians and the British.

African-American females also played a major role as spies during the Revolutionary War. They kept Colonial authorities informed on the British. With the promise of freedom from slavery as a motivating factor, the African-American woman found innovative ways to assist. According to Lucy Terry's written accounts of the war, Black women disguised themselves as men and fought side by side with them against the British, and kept the homes so that White women could go near their husbands during engagements. Phillis Wheatley, a very literate Black woman, used her writing ability to praise and express appreciation for General George Washington during the Revolutionary War. He showed his appreciation by inviting her to visit him at his headquarters in February of 1776.

Phillis Wheatley

War of 1812

The War of 1812 was basically a naval war. Female assistance was limited to making bandages and tending the sick and wounded sailors. Additionally, Black women were able to take care of the farms so that the White men could leave their homes and families and go off to war knowing things would run smoothly.

Civil War

Harriet Tubman became an inspiration to all who loved and valued freedom. She served as a Union spy, an unpaid soldier, a volunteer nurse, and a freedom fighter. She loved freedom so much that she left her husband and brother behind when they chose not to run the risk of escaping from freedom. During the war, she earned the name "General" Tubman from the soldiers in the field.

Harriet Tubman

Another former slave, Susan King Taylor, became famous for her volunteer service during the Civil War. She escaped from slavery at the age of 12 and was teaching freedmen by the time she was 16. During the war, Taylor met Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross, who inspired her. Taylor volunteered as a nurse and launderer for Black Civil War troops as she traveled with her husband's unit, the 33rd United States Colored Troops. She formed the Boston Branch of the Women's Relief Corps after the war. Her memoirs, published in 1902, became the only written record of Black volunteer nurses in the Civil War.

Spanish-American War

Black American females again played the role of nurses. During this war, over 75 percent of all deaths resulted from typhoid and yellow fever. Many Black female volunteer nurses were told that they were immune to the diseases because their skin was darker and thicker. Because of this, many of them exposed themselves to the diseases and became casualties when they returned home. Because of segregated living areas, the Whites never knew the high rate of casualties that these women suffered. The Army was so pleased with the 32 contract Black nurses, however, that many congressmen tried but failed to create a permanent corps of Army nurses.

World War I

For the first time in military history, the African-American females had an official organization where they found leadership and direction to use their abilities. The National Association of Colored Graduate Nurses had been founded in 1909. In 1917, the co-founder of the Red Cross urged Black nurses to enroll in the American Red Cross, although they were not accepted until two months before the war ended in November 1918. African-American females continued to serve by making bandages, taking over jobs that men held so they could be soldiers, working in hospitals and troop centers, and serving in other relief organizations as they had in previous wars. Many served in Hostess Houses operated by the Young Women's Christian Association, where they wrote letters home for illiterate soldiers and read incoming mail to them.

World War II

It was not until World War II (1942) that women were officially allowed to serve in great numbers in the armed forces. The Army had the Women's Army Corps (WAC); the Navy had Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES); and the Coast Guard had the SPARS. The majority of African-American women served in the WAC. They remained in segregated units, as did the African-American men. Although the Navy intended to increase the number of African-Americans to 10 percent, there were still less than 50 Black WAVES by 1945. The U.S. Coast Guard had even less in the SPARS. Out of the highest number of women in the military during this period (271,000), only 4,000 were African-American women, simply because there just weren't any opportunities for them. African-American women continued to serve from the Korean Conflict through Viet Nam to Operation Desert Storm.

During WWII the first all black WAC group to serve overseas was the 6888th Postal Unit in England and then France. Here Major Charity Adams reviews the troops in Birmingham England. (National Archives).

Desert Storm

African-American women served with distinction during Operation Desert Storm, as officers, noncommissioned officers, and enlisted soldiers. Of the 35,000 females who went to Desert Storm, an estimated 40 percent of them were African-Americans. According to SSG Betty Brown of the Washington, DC, Army National Guard, all of these women endured the heat and the primitive conditions: no electricity, no running water, no bathrooms, and the sanitation details (cleaning the 10 gallon trash cans that served as toilets).

An African-American woman, LT Phoebe Jeter, who headed an all-male platoon, ordered 13 Patriots fired (anti-missile missiles), destroying at least two Scuds (Iraqi surface-to-surface missiles). (15:100) Another African-American woman, CPT Cynthia Mosely, commanded Alpha Company, 24th Support Battalion Forward, 24th Infantry Division (Mechanized), a 100-person unit that supplied everything from fuel to water to ammunition. Her unit resupplied fuel for all of the forward brigades because it was closest to the front lines.

Ensign Matice Wright, the Navy`s first black female naval flight officer,poses for DOD photograph.

Wright was assigned to Fleet Air Reconnaissance Squadron 3 (VQ-3). Date: 01 MAY 1993

These women who served in the military since pre-colonial days have paved the way for new recruits and current active duty females to follow. When we look at the statistical data of African-American women entering the military, we find that Black women in FY 1993 comprised 33 percent of Army female recruits, 22 percent of Navy female recruits, 17 percent of Marine Corps female recruits and 18 percent of Air Force female recruits. (21:2-10) Today the statistics tell us that 30.3 percent of the military is African-American women; approximately 33.6 percent serve as enlisted, and 13.1 percent serve as commissioned and warrant officers.

Sgt Danyell E. Wilson, first black woman Tomb Sentinel

The following African-American females have attained the rank of general officer: currently on active duty, BG Marcelite Jorden-Harris, Director Maintenance, Headquarters United States Air Force/LG, and retired from the U.S. Army BG Clara L. Adams-Ender and BG Sherian G. Cadoria.

BGEN Marcelite Harris.

Military Firsts

March 8, 1945, Phyllis Mae Daily, the first Black nurse was sworn into the Navy Nurse Corps in New York City.

February 12, 1948, the first Black nurse joined the Regular Army Nurse Corps.

In July 1974, Reverend Alice Henderson was commissioned as a chaplain, becoming the first female chaplain, Black or White.

Also in July 1974, five Black women out of a group of 15 women became cadets at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy.

In May 1975, Lieutenant Donna P. Davis became the first Black woman doctor in the Naval Medical Corps.

In November 1979, Second Lieutenant Marcella A. Hayes is the fifty-fifth woman out of 48,000 officers to graduate from the Army Aviation School in Ft Rucker, Alabama. She became the first Black woman pilot in the U.S. armed forces.

In September 1979, Hazel Winifred Johnson became the first Black woman promoted to the rank and position of Brigadier General, Chief of the Army Nurse Corps

In December 1980, Ensign Brenda Robinson became the first Black female aviator in the U.S. Navy assigned to the Fleet Logistics Squadron Forty in Norfolk, Virginia.

On May 18, 1983, Angela Dennis of Arkansas became one of the first two Black women to graduate from the United States Coast Guard Academy in New London, Connecticut.

Source: Ms. Jacqueline Hodge, an Instructional Systems Specialist at the U.S. Armor School at Fort Knox, Kentucky, served as a participant in the Topical Research Intern Program at the Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute (DEOMI) in March 1995. She conducted extensive research on African-American women and prepared this report. The Institute thanks Ms. Hodge for her contributions to the research efforts.

There is also the National Association Of Black Military Women (NABMW) - A short outline on the NABMW history can be found at: National Association of Black Military Women Contact for the National Association of Black Military Women is:

c/o LTC Kathaleen Harris
5695 Pine Meadows Ct.
Morrow, GA 30260
email: KHNABMW@AOL.COM

Please note: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is displayed without profit or payment for those who have expressed an interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. Photos and images are from the National Archives, The Naval History Center, The U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, Defense Visual Information Center, and the personal collections of this author. Nothing on this site is for sale nor is it a commercial venture of any kind - it is a one person page for, and about military women - by one retired military woman.

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military women in film. military women in tv

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Many visitors have requested information about the contributions of African American women to the military. African-American women played major support roles during the Colonial period by providing help to the militia.

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Women, Native Americans, and African Americans during the American Revolution

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Women, Native Americans, and African Americans during the American Revolution

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Prior to the American Revolution, women's participation in communal life was mainly relegated to the domestic sphere and dependent roles. They cooked, cleaned, bore children, and assisted on the family farm. These gender-centric duties were often denigrated, leaving women with little sense of self-worth.

As unrest grew in the colonies, gender roles began to shift. Patriot women became politically aware. They supported economic boycotts of British-made goods. Some joined in public protest meetings against British rule, while others collected money in support of the Patriots. When their husbands and sons joined local militias or the Continental Army, which had been established by the Second Continental Congress, women took on roles typically considered masculine. They managed the family farm or business and became accountable for any additional responsibilities of the men who were off at war.

Both married and single women followed the army camps. Some did this to be close to their husbands, while others looked to the Continental Army for protection. In the camps, women performed chores such as washing laundry, mending uniforms, cooking meals, and providing nursing care.

Some women, like Deborah Sampson Gannet and the legendary Molly Pitcher, found less conventional ways to support the Patriot cause. Deborah Sampson Gannet disguised herself as a man and joined the Continental Army. Molly Pitcher was a folkloric figure who carried pitchers of water to the battlefield to help cool the cannons while her husband fought. Many believe that Molly Pitcher was a real person. It is possible she was Mary Ludwig Hays McCauly-who joined her husband William Hays on the battlefield at the Battle of Monmouth on June 28, 1778.

Through these widespread activities, women expanded Americans' concept of gender roles. By the end of the war women's sense of self-worth had been raised, and society now placed greater value on their contributions. Though the Constitution did not grant women the right to vote, many male legislators welcomed women's participation in electoral activities. In addition to their political activism, women emerged from the Revolution with increased access to education.

Cannons became so hot in use they could explode if not cooled after each shot. Molly Pitcher delivered pitchers of water to prevent cannons from overheating during the Battle of Monmouth.
Credit: Courtesy of the Library of Congress, LC-USZ6-2336

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Women, Native Americans, and African Americans during the American Revolution - Course Hero

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Prior to the American Revolution, women's participation in communal life was mainly relegated to the domestic sphere and dependent roles. They cooked, cleaned, bore children, and assisted on the family farm. These gender-centric duties were often denigrated, leaving women with little sense of self-worth. As unrest grew in the colonies, gender roles began to shift.

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Women played critical roles in the American Revolution and subsequent War for Independence. Historian Cokie Roberts considers these women our Founding Mothers.

Women like Abigail Adams, the wife of Massachusetts Congressional Delegate John Adams, influenced politics as did Mercy Otis Warren. It was Abigail Adams who famously and voluminously corresponded with her husband while he was in Philadelphia, reminding him that in the new form of government that was being established he should "remember the ladies" or they too, would foment a revolution of their own. Warren, just as politically astute as Adams, was a prolific writer, not only recording her thoughts about the confluence of events swirling around Boston but also dabbling in playwriting. She was a fierce devotee to the patriot cause, writing in December 1774, four months before the war broke out at Lexington and Concord, "America stands armed with resolution and virtue, but she still recoils at the idea of drawing the sword against the nation from whence she derived her origin." In 1805 she published History of the Rise, Progress, and Termination of the American Revolution.

Women often followed their husbands in the Continental Army. These women, known as camp followers, often tended to the domestic side of army organization, washing, cooking, mending clothes, and providing medical help when necessary. Sometimes they were flung into the vortex of battle. Such was the case of Mary Ludwig Hays, better known as Molly Pitcher, who earned fame at the Battle of Monmouth in 1778. Hays first brought soldiers water from a local well to quench their thirst on an extremely hot and humid day and then replaced her wounded husband at his artillery piece, firing at the oncoming British. In a similar vein, Margaret Corbin was severely wounded during the British assault on Fort Washington in November 1776 and left for dead alongside her husband, also an artilleryman, until she was attended by a physician. She lived, though her wounds left her permanently disabled. History recalls her as the first American female to receive a soldier's lifetime pension after the war.

Phillis Wheatley, an enslaved African American living in Boston, took up the pen and wrote poetry, becoming one of the first published female authors in America and the first African American woman to be published. Her 1773 collection Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral was popular on both sides of the Atlantic. Her poems focused on patriotism and human virtues. She even wrote a poem about George Washington, "To His Excellency, George Washington" in 1775, which she personally read to him at his Cambridge headquarters in 1776 while he was with the Continental Army in Massachusetts besieging the British. Her visit was the result of an invitation from Washington. Wheatley obtained her freedom upon the death of her master in 1778.

New York teenager Sybil Ludington, was the female equivalent of Paul Revere, though she rode twice as far as Revere and in a driving rainstorm in April, 1777. Her ride took her through Putnam and Dutchess Counties, New York where she roused local militia to fight a British force that had attacked nearby Danbury, Connecticut. The Daughters of the American Revolution erected a heroic equestrian statue to Ludington in Carmel, New York along the forty-mile route she traveled.

The story of one of the most famous revolutionary women, Betsy Ross, is likely just that - a story. Ross is often credited with sewing the first American flag, thirteen red and white stripes with thirteen stars in a field of blue in the corner. Subsequent research, however, shows that the story only surfaced around the Centennial, 1876, and was promoted by Ross's grandson William Canby. Given that Congress passed the Flag Act in June of 1777, nearly a year after Ross is purported to have made the flag, the story is likely apocryphal.

As wives of the common soldier often followed the Continental Army so, too, did the wives of general officers. General Henry Knox, the Continental Army's Artillery Commander married the vivacious and popular Bostonian Lucy Flucker, the daughter of Bostonian Loyalists. Once she and Henry were married, all ties between her and her family were cut. Henry and Lucy were devoted to one another and she would join him whenever she could while he was on campaign. She endured the bitter encampment at Valley Forge and became fast friends with the wife of General Nathanael Greene, the equally popular Kitty. George Washington's wife, Martha Custis, spent every winter with her husband wherever the army was camped. In fact, once George Washington left his beloved Mount Vernon estate in 1775 to attend the 2nd Continental Congress in Philadelphia, he did not return to his home until 1781, as the combined American and French Army maneuvered south from the city of New York to Yorktown, Virginia, where the war was eventually won. The wives of generals were as equally helpful in matters of caring and providing compassion to sick and wounded soldiers, as were the wives of the common soldiers.

Ordinary women also endured the horrors of the battlefield when those fights came to their doorstep. Sally Kellogg of Vermont and her family escaped the gods of War in 1776 when the War for Independence found its way into the northern reaches of upstate New York and Benedict Arnold's makeshift fleet and the British Navy clashed on Lake Champlain during the Battle of Valcour Island. As the Kellogg family made good its escape by water, Sally's family "fell in between Arnold's fleet and the British fleet," she later recalled. As the family rowed to safety at Fort Ticonderoga, the exchange of gunfire between ships could be seen and heard Sally recalled, "but happy for us the balls went over us. We heard them whis." Nevertheless, the war continued to follow the Kellogg family. A year later, after having relocated to Bennington, Vermont the Kelloggss were once more forced to be witnesses to carnage and once again upon recollection Sally claimed the results were, "a sight to behold. There was not a house [in Bennington's vicinity] but was stowed full of wounded.

Not unlike women eighty years later who disguised themselves as men to serve in the armies of the Civil War, women of the Revolutionary Era also itched to get into the fight, do their part for the cause, and be engaged in a historical moment. One of the best examples of a woman who disguised herself as a man to fight in the Continental Army was Deborah Sampson from Uxbridge, Massachusetts. Amazingly, she also has a paper trail concerning her combat service in the army, where she fought under the alias of Robert Shurtliff, the name of her deceased brother, in the light infantry company of the Fourth Massachusetts Regiment. She mustered into service in the spring of 1782 and saw action in Westchester County, New York just north of the City of New York where she was wounded in her thigh and forehead. Not wanting her identity to be revealed during medical care she permitted physicians to treat her head wound and then slipped out of the field hospital unnoticed, where she extracted one of the bullets from her thigh with a penknife and sewing needle. The other bullet was lodged too deep and her leg never fully healed. Her identity was finally revealed during the summer of 1783 when she contracted a fever while on duty in Philadelphia. The physician who treated her kept her secret and cared for her. After the Treaty of Paris, she was given an honorable discharge from the army by Henry Knox. Like other veterans of the Continental Army, she was continually petitioning the state and federal government for her service pension. She later married and had three children settling down in Sharon, Massachusetts. To help make ends meet she often gave public lectures about her wartime service. By the time she died in 1827, she was collecting minimal pensions for her service from Massachusetts and the federal government. In her memory a statue stands today outside the public library, in Sharon, honoring her Revolutionary War service and sacrifices.

Many women of all stripes and from all backgrounds recognized the value of the American cause and stepped up to serve the cause of the new nation as best they could.

Further Reading:

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Women played critical roles in the American Revolution and subsequent War for Independence. Historian Cokie Roberts considers these women our Founding...

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Roles of Native Americans During the Revolutionary War

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Roles of Native Americans During the Revolutionary War

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Isaac Makos Isaac Makos is an Interpretive Supervisor at George Washington’s Mount Vernon.

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Roles of Native Americans during the Revolution

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Native Americans served both the Crown and the colonists during the Revolutionary War. The civil war among European settlers created civil war and strife among…

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The American Revolution Through the Eyes of the Native Americans

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The American Revolution Through the Eyes of the Native Americans

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Adam E. Zielinski • March 18, 2020 • Updated October 24, 2023

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Allies and Enemies: British and American Attitudes towards Native Americans during the Revolution

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The framing of the American Revolution through the eyes of Native Americans has always been plagued with bias and misinformation. For historians and students…

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Mohawk Indian Thayendanega, also known as Joseph Brant, served in the British army as an interpreter of native languages during the Revolutionary War.

While the previous explorations of African American and white female experience suggest both the gains and limitations produced in the Revolutionary Era, from the perspective of almost all Native Americans the American Revolution was an unmitigated disaster. At the start of the war Patriots worked hard to try and ensure Indian neutrality, for Indians could provide strategic military assistance that might decide the struggle. Gradually, however, it became clear to most native groups, that an independent America posed a far greater threat to their interests and way of life than a continued British presence that restrained American westward expansion.

Cherokees and Creeks (among others tribes) in the southern interior and most Iroquois nations in the northern interior provided crucial support to the British war effort. With remarkably few exceptions, Native American support for the British was close to universal.

This drawing shows an Iroquois warrior dressed for battle.

The experience of the Iroquois Confederacy in current-day northern New York provides a clear example of the consequences of the Revolution for American Indians. The Iroquois represented an alliance of six different native groups who had responded to the dramatic changes of the colonial era more successfully than most other Indians in the eastern third of North America. Their political alliance, which had begun to take shape in the 15th- century, even before the arrival of European colonists, was the most durable factor in their persistence in spite of the disastrous changes brought on by European contact. During the American Revolution, the Confederacy fell apart for the first time since its creation as different Iroquois groups fought against one another.

The Mohawk chief Thayendanegea (known to Anglo-Americans as Joseph Brant) was the most important Iroquois leader in the Revolutionary Era. He convinced four of the six Iroquois nations to join him in an alliance with the British and was instrumental in leading combined Indian, British, and Loyalist forces on punishing raids in western New York and Pennsylvania in 1778 and 1779. These were countered by a devastating Patriot campaign into Iroquois country that was explicitly directed by General Washington to both engage warriors in battle and to destroy all Indian towns and crops so as to limit the military threat posed by the Indian-British alliance.

In spite of significant Native American aid to the British, the European treaty negotiations that concluded the war in 1783 had no native representatives. Although Ohio and Iroquois Indians had not surrendered nor suffered a final military defeat, the United States claimed that its victory over the British meant a victory over Indians as well. Not surprisingly, due to their lack of representation during treaty negotiations, Native Americans received very poor treatment in the diplomatic arrangements. The British retained their North American holdings north and west of the Great Lakes, but granted the new American republic all land between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River. In fact, this region was largely unsettled by whites and mostly inhabited by Native Americans. As a Wea Indian complained about the failed military alliance with the British, "In endeavoring to assist you it seems we have wrought our own ruin." Even groups like the Oneida, one of the Iroquois nations that allied with the Americans, were forced to give up traditional lands with other native groups.

When British General John Burgoyne marched from Canada to Albany, some of the Native American warriors he enlisted began killing settlers. When the news of Jane McCrea's murder reached major cities, many young Americans enlisted to fight.

Despite the sweeping setback to Native Americans represented by the American Revolution, native groups in the trans-Appalachian west would remain a vital force and a significant military threat to the new United States. Relying on support from Spanish colonists in New Orleans as well as assistance from the British at Fort Detroit, varied native groups continued to resist Anglo-American incursions late into the 19th century.

This ongoing resistance resulted in treaties with the United States that would much later be the basis for redressing some illegal losses of Indian lands. Although the meaning of the Revolution for most Native American groups was disastrous, their continued struggle for autonomy, independence, and full legal treatment resulted in partial victories at a much later date. In some ways, this native struggle showed a more thorough commitment to certain revolutionary principles than that demonstrated by the Patriots themselves.

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Native Americans During the Revolutionary War

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Native Americans During the Revolutionary War

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Many Native American tribes fought in the Revolutionary War. The majority of these tribes fought for the British but a few fought for the Americans.

Many of these tribes tried to remain neutral in the early phase of the war but when some of them came under attack by American militia, they decided to join the British.

Other tribes joined the British in the hopes that if the British won, they would put a stop to colonial expansion in the west, as they had done with the Royal Proclamation of 1763.

The following is a list of the various tribes who fought in the Revolutionary War:

Wabanaki Confederacy:

The Wabanaki Confederacy was an alliance of five northern tribes: the Penboscot, Maliseet, Passamaquoddy, Abenaki and Micmac.

As a whole, the tribes of the Wabanaki Confederacy were reluctant to join the war effort but some members of the various tribes did take part in a few engagements, according to Colin G. Calloway in his book The American Revolution in Indian Country:

"In Maine and Nova Scotia, Passamaquoddies, Micmacs, and Maliseets were reluctant to become involved in a war that had little to offer them. Massachusetts passed a resolution in July of 1776 that five hundred Micmac and Maliseet (Saint Johns) Indians be employed in the continental service. Maliseet chiefs Ambrose St. Aubin and Pierre Tomah sometimes spoke as if they were engaged in a common cause to protect their lands and liberties, but eastern Indians often deftly avoided the billigerent's recruiting efforts. Delegates who attended the Treaty of Watertown in 1776 exceeded their authority in committing the tribes to the American cause. The tribes split as British power and British goods exerted increasing influence. About a hundred principal men of the Micmac, Maliseet, and Passamaquoddy tribes took an oath of allegiance to King George between September 1778 to January 1779. With chief Ornon 'hearty in our cause,' a company of Penobscots served in the United States and figured prominently in the action at Penobscot in 1779. A dozen Pigwackets from western Maine petitioned Massachusetts for permission to enlist." (Calloway 36.)

The Maliseet was a tribe with a population of several hundred that lived in Maine, and the Passamaquoddy was an eastern group of Maliseet that lived in Maine and New Brunswick.

After the American Revolution began and hostilities broke out, the Passamaquoddy allied themselves with the Americans early in the war and the rest of the Maliseet tribe later joined them but the tribe didn't participate in many battles, according to an article about the Passamaquoddy by Nicholas Smith on Cornell University's website:

"It was considered a great victory for the Americans when several hundred Maliseet and a few Micmac joined the Passamaquoddy at Machias, Maine. The Indians retained their way of life, living together as was their custom, and hunting game for food. There was little actual fighting, but the Americans had the satisfaction of knowing that several hundred Maliseet would not join English forces. Their biggest contribution was as spies going to Canada and returning with news of the English plans, and attacking English coastal shipping. The Indians played a leading role in preventing an English attack on Machias by sea from being successful. The story of a young Indian lad who shot and killed the English officer of a landing barge, resulting in the English retreat, has become an important traditional tale among the Passamaquoddy."

On July 19, 1776, the Micmac and Maliseet signed the Treaty of Watertown, which was a treaty of alliance and friendship signed between the two tribes and the United States.

On December 24, 1776, General George Washington wrote the Passamaquoddy tribe a letter asking them to send him warriors. The Penobscot tribe and the Passamaquoddy responded by providing 600 warriors.

In August of 1777, Chief Francis Joseph Neptune of the Passamaquoddy tribe reportedly fired one of the first shots of the Battle of Machias in Maine, hitting and killing a British officer standing on the deck of the British frigate Mermaid at a considerable distance.

Throughout the war, the Massachusetts government continued to provide the Passamaquoddy with supplies and ammunition in recognition of their service.

After the war ended in 1783, Neptune worked continuously to prevent white encroachment on Indian lands in Maine.

In 1796, Neptune and other tribal leaders secured a land treaty from the Massachusetts government that included a 23,000 acre reservation near Perry, Maine.

The Penobscot, a tribe with a population of a few hundred who lived in Maine, had been long-standing allies of the French during the earlier colonial wars.

The Penobscot never formally sided with the Americans during the Revolutionary War and refused to commit the tribe as a whole to the war effort but allowed some of their young men to enlist.

Some Penobscot served as scouts for Washington's army and Penobscot warriors fought in a number of campaigns during the war, including the American campaign against Quebec in 1775 and the Penobscot Expedition in 1779.

In recognition for their service, the Penobscot were later awarded a reservation at Indian Island, Old Town, Maine around 1798.

The Abenaki, a tribe who lived in northern New England and the southern part of the Canadian Maritimes, were divided on the issue of the Revolutionary War and fought in small engagements for both the British and the Americans, according to Calloway:

"...and Abenakis served in small-scale operations on both sides during the war. But beneath the surface confusion and ambivalence, all Abenakis at all times shared the goal of preserving their community and keeping the war at arm's length. All they disagreed on was the means to that end. Neutrality was a perilous strategy, more likely to make the village a target than a haven when British and Americans alike adhered to the notion that if Indians were not fighting for you they would fight against you. Many Abenakis opted instead for limited and sometimes equivocal involvement in the conflict. The family-band structure of Abenaki society meant that different people could espouse different allegiances without tearing the community apart. Individual participation on both sides, though limited and part of no master strategy, also allowed flexibility as the fortunes of war shifted. The Revolution would not leave the Abenakis alone, but they could divert it into less destructive channels." (Calloway 65)

In 1777, the British recruited about 400 warriors from the Abenaki villages of Odanak, Becanour, Caughnawga, Saint Regis and Lake of the Two Mountains into Burgoyne's campaign.

The disastrous campaign only strengthened the Abenaki's reluctance to support the British in the war and many Abenaki began to take an anti-British stance. As a result, the Abenaki became even more divided over the war.

In 1781, American Colonel John Allen raised an Abenaki regiment at Machias which harassed British shipping along the Maine coast during the war. Meanwhile, other Abenaki served with the British and raided Maine's Androscoggin valley.

After the war ended, only about 1,000 Abenaki remained. With the American victory in the war, more and more white settlers began to encroach on Abenaki land and various states began to buy up Abenaki land.

In the first ten years after the war, most of the Abenaki left the United States and settled in Canada. In 1805, Canada awarded the Abenaki land for a reservation.

Animosity between the Abenaki and the Americans continued into the 19th century, prompting many warriors to fight for the British in the War of 1812.

The Micmac (also spelled Mi'kmaq), a tribe with a population of around 3,000 who lived in the Canadian maritimes, allied themselves with the Americans during the Revolutionary War, hoping that overthrowing the British would restore French rule in North America.

In February of 1776, George Washington wrote a letter to the Grand Chief of the Micmac tribe asking for their assistance in the war.

Seven captains of the Micmac and three Maliseet captains responded and traveled to Watertown, Mass on July 10, 1776. Major Shaw brought these captains in his sloop from Machias, Maine to Salem, Mass where they continued their journey to Watertown in carriages provided by the military.

On July 19, 1776, the Micmac and Maliseet signed the Treaty of Watertown, which was a treaty of alliance and friendship signed between the two tribes and the United States.

In the early 1800s, the Micmacs were awarded land for a reservation in the Canadian maritimes.

Stockbridge-Mohican Tribe:

The Stockbridge-Mohican, a tribe who lived in Western Massachusetts, sided with the Americans in the Revolutionary War, even though they had been long-standing allies of the British and even served in militia units during King George's War, the French and Indian War and Pontiac's Uprising.

Their decision to ally themselves with the Americans was probably based on a number of factors, according to an article by Bryan Rindfleisch on the Journal of the American Revolution website:

"While such a decision likely involved a multitude of factors, one cannot get past the fact that the Mohican were completely surrounded by a settler community, known for its rabid opposition to the Stamp Act as well as for being a hotbed of activity for the Sons of Liberty. It would take no leap of the imagination to believe that the Mohican felt enormous pressure, if not the threat of intimidation and violence, to join the revolutionary movement. Yet the Stockbridge-Mohican also saw the revolution undoubtedly as an opportunity. If they sided with the American rebels and proved their loyalty, the new nation might respect or honor their attempts to reclaim lost lands and to protect their sovereignty."

In April of 1774, the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts sent a message to Chief Solomon Wahaunwanwanmeet of the Stockbridge Nation informing him of the possibility of a war with the British and asked for continued friendly relations with his tribe. In response, Chief Solomon visited Boston and made a speech pledging the loyalty of his tribe. (Pope 17.)

The Stockbridge Mohicans went on to fight in some of the earliest battles of the war and were reportedly among the militiamen at Lexington and Concord in April of 1775, according to Rindfleisch.

Mohican warriors are said to have lined up alongside American militiamen along Battle Road and fired upon British soldiers as they marched back to Boston and then joined the militiamen in Cambridge as they besieged the British army within Boston.

During the ten-month-long Siege of Boston, the Stockbridge Mohicans helped build fortifications, patrolled the outer defenses and even conducted ambushes on British forces.

In addition, the Stockbridge Mohicans even fought in the Battle of Bunker Hill, during which a Mohican Indian, Abraham Naumanmpputaunky, was killed.

Although George Washington was reluctant to allow the Stockbridge Mohicans to officially join the Continental Army, he eventually had a change of heart and allowed them to enlist.

A regiment of Stockbridge Mohicans participated in the campaign at Valcour Bay in October of 1776, in the Saratoga campaign in 1777, they camped at Valley Forge in the winter of 1777-8 and also participated in the campaign against the Iroquois Confederacy, known as the "Sullivan Expedition," in 1779.

The Stockbridge Mohicans were not sufficiently rewarded for their service though and their families at home went hungry and half naked, receiving no aid from the Continental Congress despite pleas on their behalf from George Washington himself.

In the meantime, white settlers continued to buy up native land in the Stockbridge area and by 1783, the Stockbridge Mohican's had lost all of their land (Calloway 103.)

In the 1780s, the Stockbridge moved to New York to escape encroachment by white settlers in Massachusetts and lived alongside the Oneida tribe.

When the U.S. government started to buy up the Oneida land in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the Mohicans migrated to present-day Wisconsin where they were later joined by a group of the Delaware people known as the Munsee.

Finally, in 1794, the federal government signed the Treaty of Canandaigua, with the Oneida, Tuscarora, and Stockbridge, and thanked the tribes for their wartime services with a gift of $5000, a new church, grist mills and saw mills and instructions in how to operate them.

Shawnee Tribe:

The Shawnee, a tribe who lived in the Ohio River Valley. sided with the British during the Revolutionary War.

When the Revolutionary War first broke out, most Shawnee tried to remain neutral and, in early 1774, around 170 Shawnee families moved away from the Scioto River Valley to avoid getting drawn into the war.

American encroachment on Shawnee land persisted though and the tribe soon became divided on the issue. Shawnee tribes that had already allied themselves with the British threatened other Shawnee tribes with attack if they sided with the colonists.

After Chief Cornstalk was murdered by American militia in 1777, it drove many of the Shawnee to side with the British, although a number of Shawnee still tried to remain neutral. As concern over American encroachment on Shawnee land grew, more Shawnee sided with the British in the spring of 1778.

The Shawnee continued to flee Ohio and by 1779 or 1780, around 1,200 Shawnees, mostly from the Thawekila, Kispoki, and Piqua divisions, led by Yellow Hawk and Black Stump, had left Ohio and begun to migrate west to Missouri.

In May of 1779, American Colonel John Bowan launched an attack on the Shawnee town of Chillicothe during which Chief Black Fish was mortally wounded.

In the summer of 1780, when Virginia militia officer George Rogers Clark invaded the area, the Shawnee burned Chillicothe themselves to prevent it from falling to Clark.

In the fall of 1782, Clark returned to Shawnee territory and, according to Daniel Boone, who was involved in the expedition, Clark burned five villages and entirely destroyed their crops.

Just as it seemed the Shawnee were winning their war, the British lost the Revolutionary War and began trying to restrain the Shawnee warriors, urging them to make peace with the Americans as they themselves had done when they signed the Treaty of Paris and warned them that if they continued to fight with the Americans then Britain could have no part of it.

The Shawnee and the Americans continued to fight long after the war was over as more and more white settlers began to encroach on Shawnee land, according to Calloway:

"For a time during the Revolution, many Shawnees came to identify Britain's cause as their own, and the dwindling of British support hit them hard. But the struggle that terminated for redcoats and patriots in 1783 did not end for the Shawnees. The Shawnees carried on the fight for another dozen years and took a leading role in an emerging multi-tribal confederacy." (Calloway 49.)

Delaware Tribe:

The Delaware (also known as the Lenni Lenape), a tribe in the Ohio Valley, sided with Americans during the Revolutionary War and signed a treaty with the United States government, the Treaty of Fort Pitt, in 1778.

The Delaware were originally neutral at the outbreak of the war but quickly came under pressure from British and American agents and from other tribes, particularly the Wyandots in the north, who were pro-British.

After the deaths of chiefs Custaloga and Netawatwees in the fall of 1776, the Delaware national council found itself divided. Many Delaware chiefs argued that an alliance with the Americans was an opportunity to assert the tribe's independence from the Six Nations and to challenge the Six Nations' claims to lands west of the Ohio.

In 1778, the United States signed its first treaty, the Treaty of Fort Pitt, with the Delaware tribe. The treaty allowed American troops to pass through Delaware territory.

In addition, the Delaware agreed to sell meat, corn, horses and other supplies to the United States and allow their men to enlist in the United States army.

The treaty also stated that the Delaware could form their own state and have a representative in Congress, if they wanted.

The treaty created division within the tribe. Some Delaware chiefs, such as White Eyes and John Killbuck of the Turtle clan, continued to support the Americans but other chiefs, like Captain Pipe of the Wolf clan, moved his followers to the Sandusky River in northwestern Ohio to be closer to the Wayndots and the British.

After signing the treaty, Chief White Eyes died of smallpox. Yet, many Delaware Indians and some historians believe he didn't die of smallpox and was instead murdered by an American militia group and then secretly buried.

In 1781, a force of about 300 Americans attacked the Delaware village of Coshocton, Ohio and a neighboring village of Licheneau. During the attack, the Americans captured and killed 15 Delaware warriors and were accused of using excessive cruelty in killing the captives.

In 1782, a group of Pennsylvania militiamen, incorrectly believed that the Delaware were responsible for several recent raids and killed around 100 Christian Delaware in what became known as the Gnadenhutten Massacre.

After the American victory in the Revolutionary War, the Delaware struggled as the Americans continued to move into the native's territory and were later forced to surrender most of their Ohio lands with the Treaty of Greenville in 1795.

In 1829, the United States forced the Delawares to relinquish their remaining land in Ohio and move west of the Mississippi River.

Miami Tribe:

The Miami, a tribe in the Great Lakes region, sided with the British during the Revolutionary War.

In late October of 1780, the war came to the Miami when French cavalry officer Augustin Mottin LeBalme, who was aiding the Americans in the war, raided the Miami village of Kekionga.

After LeBalme plundered the area for 12 days, on November 5, 1780, Chief Little Turtle attacked the force and killed LeBalme and 30 of his soldiers, bringing the fight to an end.

After the British lost the war, the Miami tribe continued to fight the Americans who began pouring into the Ohio country. Between the years 1783 and 1790, the Miami tribe killed 1,500 settlers.

This sparked a war between the Americans and the Miami tribe, the Miami War, which is also known as Little Turtle's War, from 1790-1794.

The Miami tribe were defeated and, in August of 1795, Chief Little Turtle and many other allied tribes signed the Treaty of Greenville, ceding most of their territory in Ohio and Indiana to the Americans.

Throughout the 19th century, the Miami continued to sign more treaties and ceded more land and the tribe eventually emigrated to Kansas in 1846 and were then removed to Oklahoma in 1867.

Wyandot Tribe:

The Wyandot (Huron), a tribe in the Great Lakes region, sided with the British during the Revolutionary War.

In May of 1782, American Colonel William Crawford led an expedition against the Wyandot town at Upper Sandusky upon orders of George Washington to attack local Indians who had sided with the British.

Crawford's army was defeated and the Wyandot captured Crawford and burned him at the stake. The site of Crawford's execution is now on the National Register of Historic Places and a monument has been erected there in his memory.

After the war, the Wyandot continued to fight the Americans who encroached on their land. There was a brief lull in the fighting from 1783-1785, and the United States, Wyandot, Delaware, Chippewa, and Ottawa tribes signed the Treaty of Fort McIntosh in 1785.

The fighting resumed shortly after though when white settlers ignored the treaty and continued to settle of Indian land. The Wyandott were eventually defeated by General Anthony Wayne at the Battle of Fallen Timbers in 1794.

The tribe surrendered most of their lands in Ohio when they signed the Treaty of Greenville and ceded even more land in the Treaty of Detroit in 1807.

In 1843, the Wyandots were forcibly removed from their remaining land and relocated to a reservation in Kansas. After the Civil War, the Ohio Wyandot were relocated to Oklahoma.

Iroquois Confederacy:

The Iroquois Confederacy, also known as the Six Nations, was an alliance of six tribes in New York and Canada: the Mohawks, Oneidas, Tuscaroras, Onondagas, Cayugas and Senecas.

The Iroquois Confederacy had been long-standing allies of the British. Yet, when the Revolutionary War broke out, the confederacy split in two when the Onondagas, Cayugas, Senecas and Mohawks sided with the British, while the Tuscarora and the Oneida sided with the Americans.

In the early years of the war, many Iroquois towns in the Mohawk and Susquehanna valleys were attacked by American troops in retaliation for siding with the British.

On March 6, 1779, George Washington stated in a letter to Major General Horatio Gates "to carry the war into the heart of the country of the six nations; to cut off their settlements, destroy their next year's crops, and do them every other mischief of which time and circumstances will permit."

On May 31, 1779, Washington wrote a letter to Major General John Sullivan advising him how to carry out these orders against the Iroquois Confederacy:

"The expedition you are appointed to command is to be directed against the hostile tribes of the six nations of Indians, with their associates and adherents. The immediate objects are the total destruction and devastation of their settlements and the capture of as many prisoners of every age and sex as possible. It will be essential to ruin their crops now in the ground and prevent their planting more."

Washington went on to add that if the natives indicate they want peace, they must earn it:

"After you have very thoroughly completed the destruction of their settlements; if the Indians should show a disposition for peace, I would have you to encourage it, on condition that they will give some decisive evidence of their sincerity by delivering up some of the principal instigators of their past hostility into our hands-Butler, Brandt, the most mischievous of the tories that have joined them or any other they may have in their power that we are interested to get into ours..."

That spring, American Colonel Goose Van Schaick raided the Onondaga settlements, destroying their crops and towns, slaughtering their livestock and capturing 33 prisoners.

In the fall of 1779, American General John Sullivan led his campaign of destruction, known as the "Sullivan Expedition," in the Iroquois country by burning 40 towns, 160,000 bushels of corn and vegetables.

Meanwhile, American General Daniel Brodhead and his 600 men attacked the western Iroquois towns, burning and plundering the Seneca and Munsee towns on the Allegheny.

The destruction in Iroquois country was so great that many Iroquois had to flee to Canada and subsist on British charity there.

The tribes that did side with the Americans, such as the Oneida, didn't fare much better because they suffered retaliation from the pro-British tribes of the confederacy.

The Oneida, a tribe in the Iroquois Confederacy who lived in western New York, originally tried to remain neutral during the early years of the war but, in 1775, they sided with the Americans. The Tuscarora also sided with the Americans, most likely due to their close relationship with the Oneida.

Some historians believe this Oneida-Colonist alliance was due to the efforts of the Oneida's Presbyterian missionary Samuel Kirkland but other historians argue that it was more likely due to a series of factors, including gradual Europianization of the Oneida, strong ties between the Oneida and the colonists, and a gradual weakening of the Iroquois Confederacy.

The decision of the Oneida to support the Americans split the Iroquois Confederacy and eventually even split the Oneida tribe itself. As the war raged on, opposing sides of the Iroquois Confederacy began to turn on each other, according to Calloway:

"Pro-British warriors burned Oneida crops and houses in revenge; Oneidas retaliated by burning Mohawk homes. The Oneidas themselves split into factions; most supported by the Americans, whereas the Cayugas lent their weight to the crown. The Onondagas struggled to maintain neutrality until American troops burned their towns in 1779. For the Iroquois, the Revolution was a war in which, in some cases literally, brother killed brother. " (Calloway 33-34.)

The Oneida went on to fight in several key battles in the war, including the battles of Oriskany, and Saratoga and their support was considered a crucial factor in preventing an early American defeat in New York state and in the war in general.

On October 22, 1784, the Fort Stanwix Treaty formally brought the fighting between the Americans the Iroquois Confederacy to an end. The treaty awarded peace and government protection to the Senecas, Mohawks, Onondoagas and Cayugas on the following conditions:

1. Six hostages shall be immediately delivered to the commissioners by the tribes until all the prisoners taken by the tribes are returned.
2. The Oneida and Tuscaroras "shall be secured in the possession of the lands on which they are settled."
3. Boundaries for the Six Nation's lands should be clearly drawn in the area indicated in the treaty.
4. The Commissioner of the United States will order goods to be delivered to the Six Nations for their use.

On December 2, 1794, the Oneida's wartime service was formally recognized by the U.S. Congress with the Treaty of Canandaigua, a document signed by President George Washington that affirmed the tribe's right to oversee their affairs and lands without interference from other governments.

In addition, the Oneidas, Tuscaroras, and Stockbridge Indians were promised a new church in addition to grist mills and saw mills and instructions in how to operate them. The tribes, in return, promised to relinquish all other claims for compensation and rewards.

Potawami Tribe:

The Potawami, a tribe in the Great Lakes region, tried to remain neutral in the Revolutionary War but eventually sided with the Americans in 1778.

The Potawami had been long-standing trading partners and military allies with the French and fought alongside them in the French and Indian War but were reluctant to get involved in another war.

In 1778, a Virginia militia officer, George Rogers Clark, brought a small army to Illinois and conquered the Midwest. Clark met with Siggenauk, a Potawami chief from Milwaukee, and convinced him to join the American's side in the Revolutionary War, according to an article on the Milwaukee Public Museum website:

"Along with another Milwaukee Potawatomi, Naakewoin, Siggenauk effected a diplomatic coup over the course of the next two years and managed to turn Potawatomi villages around the southern shore of Lake Michigan against the British. When the British tried to recruit local Indians for their cause, they made little headway."

In 1780, Chiefs Siggenauk and Naakewoin attacked a British force of Indians and French Canadians.

In 1781, Chief Siggenauk led an Indian force from St. Louis and attacked a British post in southwestern Michigan.

When the Americans won the war, they took the entire Midwest from the British in the Treaty of Paris in 1783.

As more and more white settlers began to move into the Ohio River Valley, the Ohio Indians found themselves in a war with the United States from 1790 to 1794. Many Potawatomi fought in this war against the Americans and the war turned many Indians against the United States, including Siggenauk.

In the early 19th century, the Shawnee joined a pan-Indian military alliance that fought with the British during the War of 1812 but the Shawnee eventually lost their stronghold on Wisconsin and other parts of the Midwest when the British lost the war and had to return their conquered lands.

After falling on hard times, the Potawatomi had ceded much of their lands to the United States by the mid-19th century and the tribe split up and relocated to various distant locations, such as Texas, Kansas, Iowa and Canada, although many stayed in Wisconsin.

Catawaba Tribe:

The Catawaba, a tribe with a population of a few hundred that lived in the Piedmont area along the border of South Carolina and North Carolina, sided with the Americans in 1775.

The Catawaba fought in numerous key battles in South and North Carolina, such as the 1776 campaign against the Cherokee, the Battle of Haw River in North Carolina, the battles of Fishing Creek and Rocky Mount in South Carolina, the Battle of Hanging Rock in South Carolina and the Battle of Eutaw Spring in 1781.

In 1780, the British invaded the South and the Catawaba villages became a temporary refuge for American troops. But the British troops eventually forced the Catawaba to flee north to Virginia when they burned their villages and confiscated their cattle and other goods.

In 1782, after General Charles Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown, the Catawaba returned home and the South Carolinians paid them for their service.

The Catawbas also received a state-recognized reservation in South Carolina as a result of their support of the Americans, which they still occupy today.

Chickasaw Tribe:

The Chickasaw, a southern tribe with a population of 4,000 who lived in Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky and Missouri, sided with the British during the Revolutionary War.

The Chickasaw had been trading partners and staunch allies of the British throughout the 18th century and continued their support for the British in the Revolutionary War.

The Chickasaw participated in the war mostly by patrolling the Mississippi River against American attacks and engaging in battles against American Colonel George Rogers Clark in present-day Illinois. Small groups of Chickasaw warriors also helped Britain defend Mobile and Pensacola against the Spanish in 1780-81.

After the war ended, the Chickasaws lost the British as trading partners and were forced to seek trade with Spain and the United States.

Choctaw Tribe:

The Choctaw, a southern tribe with a population of 15,000 who inhabited about 50 villages in a key strategic position of the lower Mississippi, were coveted by both the Americans and the British during the Revolutionary War but the tribe sided with the British.

At the start of the Revolutionary War, the British hired Choctaw warriors to patrol the Mississippi River against American attacks.

In February of 1778, American Captain James Willing led an expedition down the river attacking British settlements all the way down to New Orleans. The British responded by organizing a band of 155 Choctaw warriors to march to one of the settlements under threat, Natchez, to protect it.

The Americans had retreated by the time the Choctaw reached Natchez but they managed to convince the Natchez residents to remain pro-British.

After Spain declared war on Britain, hundreds of Choctaw warriors helped the British defend Mobile in 1780 and Pensacola in 1780-81, even though a small faction of Choctaw warriors supported Spain.

After the British lost the war, the Choctaw lost the British as trading partners and were forced to seek trade with Spain and the United States.

Creek Tribe:

The Creek, a southern tribe with a population of 15,000 that lived in Georgia, Alabama, Florida, and North Carolina, never officially joined the war effort, preferring instead to engage in cautious participation.

Factionalism within the tribe was a major factor in preventing the tribe from unifying and joining the war effort. Creek towns were divided among the Lower Towns and Upper Towns, with each town asserting its own foreign policies.

Access to European manufactured goods were the Creek's biggest concern and the war put trade relations in jeopardy.

Yet, the war also provided Creek men with the ability to acquire trade goods by providing military services, especially in the Mobile and Pensacola campaigns between Britain and Spain in 1780-81.

Still other Creeks used the war to strengthen their political positions by taking leadership roles in diplomacy.

Nevertheless, the Creek tribe never engaged in significant sustained fighting during the war.

Cherokee Tribe:

The Cherokee, a southern tribe with a population of about 8,500 who lived in the interior hill country of the Carolinas and Georgia, sided with the British during the Revolutionary War.

In the spring of 1776, young warriors, led by Cherokee Chief Dragging Canoe, launched attacks on the American frontier in the Carolinas and Georgia in retaliation for illegal encroachments on their lands, according to an article on the Encyclopedia of Alabama website:

"The willingness of Dragging Canoe and other warriors to take the fight to white settlers stemmed in part from a generational split among the Cherokees: young warriors increasingly distrusted their elders' abilities to prevent further land loss."

In response, the colonial governments of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia organized retaliatory expeditions against the Cherokees.

During the summer and fall of 1776, they invade and burned nearly all of the local Cherokee villages, in what became known as the Cherokee War of 1776.

In August of 1776, American Colonel Andrew Williamson, with 1,800 troops and some Catawba scouts, marched to northwestern South Carolina, burning Cherokee villages along the way.

In September of 1776, American General Griffith Rutherford attacked the Cherokee Middle settlements from North Carolina and destroyed 36 towns, along with livestock and cornfields while Williamson attacked the Lower towns with his soldiers.

The two generals then joined forces and spent two weeks attacking and destroying the Cherokee Middle settlements while American Colonel William Christian and his 2,000 Virginia and North Carolina militiamen invaded the Cherokee Overhill towns, destroying their crops, apple trees, houses and food supplies.

In 1777, the older Cherokee chiefs began pushing for peace, while Dragging Canoe and hundreds of other Cherokees moved south and west to establish new villages on Chickamauga Creek. The tribe soon became divided on the issue, according to Calloway:

"Refugee Cherokees fled to the Creeks, the Chickasaws, and to Penscola. The nation split along generational lines as many younger warriors followed the lead by Dragging Canoe. Some five hundred families seceded to form new communities on the Chickamauga River. The Chickamauga towns became the core of the Cherokee resistance, attracting warriors from other towns and supporting the war effort of the Shawnees and their northern allies. Other Cherokees suffered as a result of Chickamauga resistance, some helped the Americans, and the Revolution became a Cherokee civil war" (Calloway 44.)

The American troops continued their attacks on Cherokee towns. In April of 1779, American Colonel Ethan Shelby invaded Chickamauga Cherokee country inflicting catastrophic damage, according to Thomas Jefferson, by "killing about a half dozen men, burning 11 towns, 20,000 bushels of corn...and taking as many goods as sold for twenty-five thousand pounds."

In the summer of 1779, British agent Alexander Cameron planned to raise a Cherokee force as soon as the crops were harvested but, in the meantime, American Brigadier General Andrew Williamson and 700 cavalrymen invaded Cherokee country.

Two Cherokee chiefs were sent to negotiate with Williamson, who agreed to spare their cornfields if the Cherokees handed over Cameron. When they refused, Williamson burned down their houses and cut down their corn.

In December of 1780, American Colonel Arthur Campbell burned around 1,000 houses and 50,000 bushels of corn belonging to the Overhill Cherokee.

In 1781, American Lieutenant Colonel Jon Sevier of the North Carolina militia destroyed fifteen Middle Cherokee towns and, the following fall and summer, destroyed new Lower Cherokee towns on the Coosa River.

Also in 1781, Andrew Picken's South Carolina militia killed fleeing Cherokee during a raid on a Cherokee settlement.

The Cherokee's price for taking the British side in the war was disastrous, according to Calloway:

"A Cherokee headman summed up the cost to his people of supporting the British against 'the madmen of Virginia': 'I...have lost in different engagements six hundred warriors, my towns have been thrice destroyed and my corn fields laid waste by the enemy" (Calloway 50.)

Sources:
Worthington, Don. "Catawba Indians Sided with Colonists in Revolutionary War." The Herald, 3 July. 2015, www.heraldonline.com/news/local/article26418919.html
Pope, Franklin Leonard. The Western Boundary of Massachusetts: A Study of Indians and Colonial History. Privately Printed, 1886.
Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico. Edited by Frederick Webb Hodge, Vol. 1, Washington Government Printing Office, 1907.
"Wyandot Indians." Ohio History Central, www.ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Wyandot_Indians
"Colonel William Crawford Proceeds to the Ohio." History.com, A&E Television Networks, 13 Nov. 2009, www.history.com/this-day-in-history/colonel-william-crawford-proceeds-toward-the-ohio
Levinson, David. "An Explanation for the Oneida-Colonist Alliance in the American Revolution." Ethnohistory, vol. 23, no. 3, 1976, pp. 265-289. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/481255.
Smith, Nicholas. "Passamaquoddy Indian Papers,1775-1912." Cornell University, rmc.library.cornell.edu/EAD/htmldocs/RMM09014.html
Rindfleisch, Bryan. "The Stockbridge -Mohican Community, 1775-1783." Journal of the American Revolution, 3 Feb. 2016, allthingsliberty.com/2016/02/the-stockbridge-mohican-community-1775-1783/
"The Treaty of Watertown." The Historical Society of Watertown, historicalsocietyofwatertownma.org/HSW/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=86
"The American Revolution." Clarke Historical Library, www.cmich.edu/library/clarke/ResearchResources/Michigan_Material_Local/Detroit_Pre_statehood_Descriptions/A_Brief_History_of_Detroit/Pages/The-American-Revolution.aspx
"Micmac History." Dickshovel.com, www.dickshovel.com/mic.html
"Abenaki History." Tolatsga.org, www.tolatsga.org/aben.html
"Maine Indians and the Revolutionary War." Native Heritage Project, 23 March. 2012, nativeheritageproject.com/2012/03/23/maine-indians-and-the-revolutionary-war/
"Revolutionary War." Oneida Indian Nation, www.oneidaindiannation.com/revolutionarywar/
"Miami Nation of Oklahoma Study Notes." Miami University, www.users.miamioh.edu/johnso58/246SNmiami.html
"Miami Indians." Michigan State University, Department of Geography, Environment , & Spatial Sciences, geo.msu.edu/extra/geogmich/Miamis.html
Gen. George Washington to Maj. Gen. Horatio Gates, March 6, 1779, John C. Fitzpatrick, ed. Writings of George Washington (Washington, D.C.: United States Government Printing Office, 1936), 14:198-200.
O'Brien, Greg. "Southeastern Indians and the American Revolution." Encyclopedia of Alabama, www.encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/h-1133
"From General George Washington to Major General John Sullivan, 31 May 1779." Founders Online,
founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-20-02-0661
Calloway, Colin G. "'We Have Always Been the Frontier': The American Revolution in Shawnee Country." American Indian Quarterly, vol. 16, no. 1, 1992, pp. 39-52. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/1185604.
Calloway, Colin G. The American Revolution in Indian Country: Crisis and Diversity in Native American Communities. Cambridge University Press, 1995.
"Journals of the Continental Congress - Speech to the Six Nations; July 13, 1775." The Avalon Project, Yale Law School, avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/contcong_07-13-75.asp
"Potawatomi History." Milwaukee Public Museum, www.mpm.edu/content/wirp/ICW-152.html
"The Native American's Roles in the American Revolution: Choosing Sides." Edsitement!, National Endowment for the Humanities, edsitement.neh.gov/lesson-plan/native-americans-role-american-revolution-choosing-sides#sect-background
Schmidt, Ethan A. Native Americans in the American Revolution. Praeger, 2014.
Calloway, G. Collin. "The American Revolution." NPS.gov, National Parks Service, www.nps.gov/revwar/about_the_revolution/american_indians.html

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Native Americans in the Revolutionary War

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Many Native American tribes fought in the Revolutionary War. The majority of these tribes fought for the British but a few fought for the Americans. Many of these tribes tried to remain neutral in the early phase of the war but when some of them came under attack by American militia, they decided to join the British.

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Legends of America:  Native Americans and the American Revolution

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Legends of America:  Native Americans and the American Revolution

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The Declaration of Independence accused King George III of unleashing "merciless Indian Savages" against innocent men, women, and children. The image of ferocious warriors propelled into action by a tyrannical monarch fixed in memory and imagination the Indians' role in the American Revolution and justified their subsequent treatment. But, many Indian nations tried to stay out of the conflict, some sided with the Americans, and those who fought with the British were not the king's pawns: they allied with the Crown as the best hope of protecting their homelands from the encroachments of American colonists and land speculators. The British government had afforded Indian lands a measure of protection by the Royal Proclamation of 1763 which had attempted to restrict colonial expansion beyond the Appalachian Mountains and had alienated many American colonists. Indians knew that the Revolution was a contest for Indian land as well as for liberty.

Some Indian tribes went to war early. Cherokee warriors, frustrated by recurrent land losses, defied the authority of older chiefs and attacked frontier settlements, only to be soundly defeated by expeditions from Virginia, Georgia, and the Carolinas. On the other hand, Indians from the mission town at Stockbridge in western Massachusetts, like most New England Indians, supported their colonial neighbors. They volunteered as minutemen even before the outbreak of the fighting, joined Washington's at the siege of Boston, and served in New York, New Jersey, and Canada.

The Revolution split the Iroquois Confederacy. The Mohawk led by Joseph Brant adhered to their long-standing allegiance to the British, and eventually, most Cayuga, Onondaga, and Seneca joined them. But, the Oneida and Tuscarora sided with the Americans, owing in large measure to the efforts of their Presbyterian missionary Samuel Kirkland. The Revolution became a civil war for the Iroquois, as Oneida clashed with Seneca at the Battle of Oriskany in 1777. Iroquois sufferings were compounded in 1779 when General John Sullivan led an American army through their country, burning forty towns and destroying crops.

In the Ohio country Guyashuta of the Seneca, Cornstalk of the Shawnee, and White Eyes of the Delaware worked hard to steer a neutral course in the early years of the war. At the Treaty of Fort Pitt in 1778, Delaware and Americans pledged "perpetual peace and friendship." But, after Americans killed White Eyes and Cornstalk, and slaughtered noncombatant Moravian Delaware at the mission town of Gnadenhutten, Ohio Indians made common cause with the British. They won victories in the West long after Cornwallis had surrendered in the East, and continued to resist American expansion for a dozen years after the Revolution.

In 1783, under the terms of the Peace of Paris, without regard to its Indian allies, Britain handed over to the new United States all its territory east of the Mississippi River, south of the Great Lakes, and north of Florida. The United States proceeded to expand westward, acquiring Indian lands by treaty and by force. The Stockbridge and Oneida who had supported the Americans lost lands as well as Seneca and Shawnee who had fought against them.

Indians fought in the Revolution for Indian liberties and Indian homelands, not for the British empire. But the image of Indian participation presented in the Declaration of Independence prevailed: most Americans believed that Indians had backed monarchy and tyranny. A nation conceived in liberty need feel no remorse about dispossessing and expelling those who had fought against its birth.

Compiled and edited by Kathy Weiser/ Legends of America, updated February 2018.

By Collin G. Calloway, National Park Service
Also See: African Americans In The Revolutionary Period American Revolution Index American Revolution Timeline Causes of the American Revolution Initial Battles for Independence Privateers in the American Revolution

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American Indians and the American Revolution

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The Declaration of Independence accused King George III of unleashing "merciless Indian Savages" against innocent men, women, and children. The image of ferocious warriors propelled into action by a tyrannical monarch fixed in memory and imagination the Indians' role in the American Revolution and justified their subsequent treatment.

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Women and the American Story:  Revolutionary War

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Women and the American Story:  Revolutionary War

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Key Ideas 1. Women played critical roles in every part of the American Revolution, from the early protest through managing the aftermath of the war. 2. The experiences of women during the American Revolution varied widely based on race, class, age, and geographic region. 3.

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Read about the women of the Revolutionary War

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Buy the Book

While countless stories recount the heroics of men who fought for American independence, far fewer chronicle the equally heroic actions of the women who served during the Revolutionary War. In her book, Founding Mothers, Cokie Roberts offers a comprehensive look at the many roles women played in the war, including soldiers, spies, nurses, and cooks. In this excerpt, Roberts describes the battlefield actions of a handful of women-representatives of many others whose stories have been lost to history.

Excerpt

America was now a country, but a country in name only, required to fight for its life. And in this first war as a nation, as in every war since, women played a significant but unsung role. In addition to the legions of women taking over for their husbands at home, often under perilous circumstances, there were genuine Revolutionary War heroines-women who served as soldiers and spies, women who tricked the enemy, women who were tricked by the enemy. Their stories are told in romantic song and story and in dust-dry pension records of the U.S. Army.

The most well-known of these women, Molly Pitcher, may not have ever existed. According to the famous story, a woman called Molly was bringing water to thirsty soldiers (that's where the 'Pitcher' comes from) during the Battle of Monmouth, New Jersey, when she saw her husband shot, then took his place firing a cannon. There's a good bit of historical debate about who this woman might have been, and whether 'Molly Pitcher' became a generic term for the female water carriers on the battlefield. But it's pretty clear that a woman was working a cannon at Monmouth and was later granted a pension by Pennsylvania 'for her services in the Revolutionary War.'

Another account of a woman warrior is considerably clearer. Margaret Corbin's husband, John, was killed firing artillery from Fort Washington, New York. His wife moved into his battle station and fought bravely, sustaining three gunshot wounds, until the British captured the post. Because her wounds disabled her, the Continental Congress awarded Margaret half the pay of a soldier and a complete outfit of clothing, or its value in cash; eventually she also received an annual clothing allowance. Not willing to leave it at that, as a member of what was called the Invalid Regiment, Margaret Corbin petitioned and won a full ration, including rum or whiskey. Many years after her death the Daughters of the American Revolution were granted their request to rebury Margaret Corbin at West Point, making her the only Revolutionary veteran to receive that honor.

What were these women doing on the battlefield in the first place? They, along with many thousands of others, went to war with their husbands and brought their children as well. Most of these so-called camp followers were extremely poor; they hadn't the wherewithal to survive at home alone. Though there's been some behind-the-hand snickering about these women for centuries, they were not prostitutes. The American camps maintained strict rules about consorting with 'bad' women, in contrast to the British, who hired women to 'service' the troops. Though he knew he couldn't turn away these destitute women, they were the bane of George Washington's sense of an orderly and disciplined army. Still, no army could do without women. They foraged for and cooked food for the soldiers, sewed and laundered their clothes, and nursed their wounds. Women were assigned battle chores as well, such as swabbing down the cannons with water. Recognizing that they were indispensable, the army paid the women for their work and issued them rations-only a fraction of what the men received, of course....

Women spies didn't present the commander in chief with any of the problems that the camp followers did, as long as they were American spies. During the dread winter at Valley Forge, he warned, on February 11, 1778, of the 'pernicious consequences' of allowing women 'to pass and repass from Philadelphia to camp, under pretence of coming out to visit their friends in the Army... but really with an intent to entice the soldiers to desert.' But there were women in Philadelphia working their wits and their wiles for the patriot cause as well, most notably Lydia Darragh, a local mortician. She used a vantage point from a window in her house to record British troop activities, then wrote them up in coded messages, which she would hide behind her son's coat buttons. He would then bring the messages to his big brother serving in Washington's army. When the British officer Major Andre arrived at her door to commandeer her house for fellow officers, Lydia asked permission to stay there as well, with some of her children. One night she heard the enemy generals plotting a surprise attack on Washington's camp. She devised a ruse to receive a pass out of the city, traveled on foot until she met up with a friendly soldier, and delivered the information to the American army in time to thwart disaster...

Down through the decades, probably much embroidered in the telling, have come dramatic stories of women riding their horses through the night, wading through dangerous waters, skirting enemy lines, braving almost certain death in order to impart crucial information to the Continental Army.... Then there were the women who disguised themselves as men and fought right alongside their male brethren. It's impossible to know how many there were--a few names are preserved in the military records, but their stories are lost...

The most famous of the women who fought as men was Deborah Sampson, who reveled in her tales of derring-do, regaling audiences on the speaking circuit for years after the war... Deborah secretly sewed a suit of men's clothes, snuck into the woods to change out of her dress, and for all intents and purposes became a man. She enlisted in the army as Robert Shurtliff and went off to war. In her three years' service, Deborah, or 'Robert,' was twice wounded but continued to volunteer for hazardous duty. Apparently tall and strong, the other soldiers called their beardless brother 'Molly,' but it never occurred to them that someone who could do her work and survive her wounds really was a girl... Years later Washington invited her to come see the Congress, which then voted her a pension and some land in recognition of her military service...
Cokie Roberts. Founding Mothers: The Women Who Raised Our Nation (New York: Harper Collins, 2004), 78-82.
Read the Revolution is produced thanks to a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities: exploring the human endeavor.

Read the Revolution is published biweekly by the Museum of the American Revolution to inspire learning about the history of the American Revolution and its ongoing relevance. Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed on this website do not necessarily reflect those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

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Buy the Book While countless stories recount the heroics of men who fought for American independence, far fewer chronicle the equally heroic actions of the women who served during the Revolutionary War. In her book, Founding Mothers , Cokie Roberts offers a comprehensive look at the many roles women played in the war, including soldiers, spies, nurses, and cooks.

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Lead-Up to the Battles of Lexington and Concord

Starting in 1764, Great Britain enacted a series of measures aimed at raising revenue from its 13 American colonies. Many of those measures, including the Sugar Act, Stamp Act and Townshend Acts, generated fierce resentment among the colonists, who protested against "taxation without representation." Boston, the site of the 1770 Boston Massacre and the 1773 Boston Tea Party, was one of the main points of resistance. King George III of Britain ramped up the military presence there, and in June 1774 he shut down the city's harbor until colonists paid for tea dumped overboard the previous year. Soon after, the British Parliament declared that Massachusetts was in open rebellion.
Did you know? Paul Revere never shouted the legendary phrase later attributed to him ("The British are coming!") as he passed from town to town during his midnight ride on April 18, 1775. The operation was meant to be conducted as discreetly as possible since scores of British troops were hiding out in the Massachusetts countryside. Furthermore, colonial Americans at that time still considered themselves British.
On April 18, 1775, Joseph Warren, a physician and member of the Sons of Liberty, learned from a source inside the British high command that Redcoat troops would march that night on Concord. Warren dispatched two couriers, silversmith Paul Revere and tanner William Dawes, to alert residents of the news.

They went by separate routes in case one of them was captured. Revere crossed the Charles River by boat to get to Charlestown, where fellow patriots were waiting for a signal about the movement of British troops. The patriots had been instructed to look at the steeple of Boston's Old North Church, which was visible to them because it was the highest point in the city.

If there was one lantern hanging in the steeple, the British were arriving by land. If there were two, the British were coming by sea. Two lanterns were set out, and the covert signal was memorialized in American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem, "Paul Revere's Ride," in which he wrote:

As Revere carried out his mission in Charlestown, Dawes left Boston and traveled along the Boston Neck peninsula. The two met up in Lexington, a few miles east of Concord, where revolutionary leaders Samuel Adams and John Hancock had temporarily holed up. Having persuaded those two to flee, a weary Revere and Dawes then set out again. On the road, they met a third rider, Samuel Prescott, who alone made it all the way to Concord. Revere was captured by a British patrol, while Dawes was thrown from his horse and forced to proceed back to Lexington on foot.

Fighting Breaks Out in Lexington and Concord

At dawn on April 19, some 700 British troops arrived in Lexington and came upon 77 militiamen gathered on the town green. A British major yelled, "Throw down your arms! Ye villains, ye rebels."

The heavily outnumbered militiamen had just been ordered by their commander to disperse when a shot rang out. To this day, no one knows which side fired first. Several British volleys were subsequently unleashed before order could be restored. When the smoke cleared, eight militiamen lay dead and nine were wounded, while only one Redcoat was injured.

The British then continued into Concord to search for arms, not realizing that the vast majority had already been relocated. They decided to burn what little they found, and the fire got slightly out of control. Hundreds of militiamen occupying the high ground outside of Concord incorrectly thought the whole town would be torched. The militiamen hustled to Concord's North Bridge, which was being defended by a contingent of British soldiers. The British fired first but fell back when the colonists returned the volley.

This was the "shot heard 'round the world" later immortalized by poet Ralph Waldo Emerson. (Emerson was not the only artist moved to depict the battle; painter Amos Doolittle, known as "The Revere of Connecticut," created four celebrated engravings of the Battles of Lexington and Concord.)

After searching Concord for about four hours, the British prepared to return to Boston, located 18 miles away. By that time, almost 2,000 militiamen-known as minutemen for their ability to be ready on a moment's notice-had descended to the area, and more were constantly arriving.

At first, the militiamen simply followed the British column. Fighting started again soon after, however, with the militiamen firing at the British from behind trees, stone walls, houses and sheds. Before long, British troops were abandoning weapons, clothing and equipment in order to retreat faster.

When the British column reached Lexington, it ran into an entire brigade of fresh Redcoats that had answered a call for reinforcements. But that did not stop the colonists from resuming their attack all the way through Menotomy (now Arlington) and Cambridge.

The British, for their part, tried to keep the colonists at bay with flanking parties and canon fire. In the evening a contingent of newly arrived minutemen from Salem and Marblehead, Massachusetts, purportedly had a chance to cut off the Redcoats and perhaps finish them off. Instead, their commander ordered them not to attack, and the British were able to reach the safety of Charlestown Neck, where they had naval support.

Effects of Lexington and Concord

The colonists did not show great marksmanship that day. As many as 3,500 militiamen firing constantly for 18 miles only killed or wounded roughly 250 Redcoats, compared to about 90 killed and wounded on their side.

The relatively low casualties of the Battles of Lexington and Concord proved they could stand up to one of the most powerful armies in the world. News of the battle quickly spread, reaching London on May 28. A few months later, the British narrowly defeated the Americans in Battle of Bunker Hill on June 17, 1775, the low number of casualties once again showing the strength of patriot forces. By the following summer, a full-scale war of independence had broken out, paving the way for the creation of the United States of America.

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Battles of Lexington and Concord - Winner, Date, Summary | HISTORY

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The Battles of Lexington and Concord, fought between colonial militiamen and British Redcoats on April 19, 1775, kicked off the American Revolutionary War.

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From the National Army Museum

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Explore more from American War of Independence

The Battles of Lexington and Concord on 19 April 1775, the famous 'shot heard 'round the world', marked the start of the American War of Independence (1775-83). Politically disastrous for the British, it persuaded many Americans to take up arms and support the cause of independence.

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The Battles of Lexington and Concord on 19 April 1775, the famous 'shot heard 'round the world', marked the start of the American War of Independence (1775-83).

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Battle of Lexington:  British point of view

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Battle of Lexington:  British point of view

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The Battle at Lexington Green, 1775 - the British Perspective

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A letter from a British soldier describes the shot heard ’round the world.

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The last stop on Boston's Freedom Trail is a shrine to the fog of war.

"Breed's Hill," a plaque reads. "Site of the Battle of Bunker Hill." Another plaque bears the famous order given American troops as the British charged up not-Bunker Hill. "Don't fire 'til you see the whites of their eyes." Except, park rangers will quickly tell you, these words weren't spoken here. The patriotic obelisk atop the hill also confuses visitors. Most don't realize it's the rare American monument to an American defeat.

In short, the nation's memory of Bunker Hill is mostly bunk. Which makes the 1775 battle a natural topic for Nathaniel Philbrick, an author drawn to iconic and misunderstood episodes in American history. He took on the Pilgrim landing in Mayflower and the Little Bighorn in The Last Stand. In his new book, Bunker Hill, he revisits the beginnings of the American Revolution, a subject freighted with more myth, pride and politics than any other in our national narrative.

" Johnny Tremain, Paul Revere's Ride, today's Tea Partiers-you have to tune all that out to get at the real story," Philbrick says. Gazing out from the Bunker Hill Monument-not at charging redcoats but at skyscrapers and clotted traffic-he adds: "You also have to squint a lot and study old maps to imagine your way back into the 18th century."

***

Boston in 1775 was much smaller, hillier and more watery than it appears today. The Back Bay was still a bay and the South End was likewise underwater; hills were later leveled to fill in almost 1,000 acres. Boston was virtually an island, reachable by land only via a narrow neck. And though founded by Puritans, the city wasn't puritanical. One rise near Beacon Hill, known for its prostitutes, was marked on maps as "Mount Whoredom."

Nor was Boston a "cradle of liberty"; one in five families, including those of leading patriots, owned slaves. And the city's inhabitants were viciously divided. At Copp's Hill, in Boston's North End, Philbrick visits the grave of Daniel Malcom, an early agitator against the British identified on his headstone as "a true son of Liberty." British troops used the patriot headstone for target practice. Yet Malcom's brother, John, was a noted loyalist, so hated by rebels that they tarred and feathered him and paraded him in a cart until his skin peeled off in "steaks."

Philbrick is a mild-mannered 56-year-old with gentle brown eyes, graying hair and a placid golden retriever in the back of his car. But he's blunt and impassioned about the brutishness of the 1770s and the need to challenge patriotic stereotypes. "There's an ugly civil war side to revolutionary Boston that we don't often talk about," he says, "and a lot of thuggish, vigilante behavior by groups like the Sons of Liberty." He doesn't romanticize the Minutemen of Lexington and Concord, either. The "freedoms" they fought for, he notes, weren't intended to extend to slaves, Indians, women or Catholics. Their cause was also "profoundly conservative." Most sought a return to the Crown's "salutary neglect" of colonists prior to the 1760s, before Britain began imposing taxes and responding to American resistance with coercion and troops. "They wanted the liberties of British subjects, not American independence," Philbrick says.

That began to change once blood was shed, which is why the Bunker Hill battle is pivotal. The chaotic skirmishing at Lexington and Concord in April 1775 left the British holed up in Boston and hostile colonists occupying the city's surrounds. But it remained unclear whether the ill-equipped rebels were willing or able to engage the British Army in pitched battle. Leaders on both sides also thought the conflict might yet be settled without full-scale war.

This tense, two-month stalemate broke on the night of June 16, in a confused manner that marks much of the Revolution's start. Over a thousand colonials marched east from Cambridge with orders to fortify Bunker Hill, a 110-foot rise on the Charlestown peninsula jutting into Boston Harbor. But the Americans bypassed Bunker Hill in the dark and instead began fortifying Breed's Hill, a smaller rise much closer to Boston and almost in the face of the British.

The reasons for this maneuver are murky. But Philbrick believes it was a "purposeful act, a provocation and not the smartest move militarily." Short on cannons, and the know-how to fire those they had with accuracy, the rebels couldn't do much damage from Breed's Hill. But their threatening position, on high ground just across the water from Boston, forced the British to try to dislodge the Americans before they were reinforced or fully entrenched.

On the morning of June 17, as the rebels frantically threw up breastworks of earth, fence posts and stone, the British bombarded the hill. One cannonball decapitated a man as his comrades worked on, "fatigued by our Labour, having no sleep the night before, very little to eat, no drink but rum," a private wrote. "The danger we were in made us think there was treachery, and that we were brought there to be all slain."

Exhausted and exposed, the Americans were also a motley collection of militia from different colonies, with little coordination and no clear chain of command. By contrast, the British, who at midday began disembarking from boats near the American position, were among the best-trained troops in Europe. And they were led by seasoned commanders, one of whom marched confidently at the head of his men accompanied by a servant carrying a bottle of wine. The British also torched Charlestown, at the base of Breed's Hill, turning church steeples into "great pyramids of fire" and adding ferocious heat to what was already a warm June afternoon.

All this was clearly visible to the many spectators crowded on hills, rooftops and steeples in and around Boston, including Abigail Adams and her young son, John Quincy, who cried at the flames and the "thunders" of British cannons. Another observer was British Gen. John Burgoyne, who watched from Copp's Hill. "And now ensued one of the greatest scenes of war that can be conceived," he wrote of the blazing town, the roaring cannons and the sight of red-coated troops ascending Breed's Hill.

However, the seemingly open pasture proved to be an obstacle course. The high, unmown hay obscured rocks, holes and other hazards. Fences and stone walls also slowed the British. The Americans, meanwhile, were ordered to hold their fire until the attackers closed to 50 yards or less. The wave of British "advanced towards us in order to swallow us up," wrote Pvt. Peter Brown, "but they found a Choaky mouthful of us."

When the rebels opened fire, the close-packed British fell in clumps. In some spots, the British lines became jumbled, making them even easier targets. The Americans added to the chaos by aiming at officers, distinguished by their fine uniforms. The attackers, repulsed at every point, were forced to withdraw. "The dead lay as thick as sheep in a fold," wrote an American officer.

The disciplined British quickly re-formed their ranks and advanced again, with much the same result. One British officer was moved to quote Falstaff: "They make us here but food for gunpowder." But the American powder was running very low. And the British, having failed twice, devised a new plan. They repositioned their artillery and raked the rebel defenses with grapeshot. And when the infantrymen marched forward, a third time, they came in well-spaced columns rather than a broad line.

As the Americans' ammunition expired, their firing sputtered and "went out like an old candle," wrote William Prescott, who commanded the hilltop redoubt. His men resorted to throwing rocks, then swung their muskets at the bayonet-wielding British pouring over the rampart. "Nothing could be more shocking than the carnage that followed the storming [of] this work," wrote a royal marine. "We tumbled over the dead to get at the living," with "soldiers stabbing some and dashing out the brains of others." The surviving defenders fled, bringing the battle to an end.

In just two hours of fighting, 1,054 British soldiers-almost half of all those engaged-had been killed or wounded, including many officers. American losses totaled over 400. The first true battle of the Revolutionary War was to prove the bloodiest of the entire conflict. Though the British had achieved their aim in capturing the hill, it was a truly Pyrrhic victory. "The success is too dearly bought," wrote Gen. William Howe, who lost every member of his staff (as well as the bottle of wine his servant carried into battle).

Badly depleted, the besieged British abandoned plans to seize another high point near the city and ultimately evacuated Boston. The battle also demonstrated American resolve and dispelled hopes that the rebels might relent without a protracted conflict. "Our three generals," a British officer wrote of his commanders in Boston, had "expected rather to punish a mob than fight with troops that would look them in the face."

The intimate ferocity of this face-to-face combat is even more striking today, in an era of drones, tanks and long-range missiles. At the Bunker Hill Museum, Philbrick studies a diorama of the battle alongside Patrick Jennings, a park ranger who served as an infantryman and combat historian for the U.S. Army in Iraq and Afghanistan. "This was almost a pool-table battlefield," Jennings observes of the miniature soldiers crowded on a verdant field. "The British were boxed in by the terrain and the Americans didn't have much maneuverability, either. It's a close-range brawl."

However, there's no evidence that Col. Israel Putnam told his men to hold their fire until they saw "the whites" of the enemies' eyes. The writer Parson Weems invented this incident decades later, along with other fictions such as George Washington chopping down a cherry tree. In reality, the Americans opened fire at about 50 yards, much too distant to see anyone's eyes. One colonel did tell his men to wait until they could see the splash guards-called half-gaiters-that British soldiers wore around their calves. But as Philbrick notes, "'Don't fire until you see the whites of their half-gaiters' just doesn't have the same ring." So the Weems version endured, making it into textbooks and even into the video game Assassin's Creed.

The Bunker Hill Monument also has an odd history. The cornerstone was laid in 1825, with Daniel Webster addressing a crowd of 100,000. Backers built one of the first railways in the nation to tote eight-ton granite blocks from a quarry south of Boston. But money ran out. So Sarah Josepha Hale, a magazine editor and author of "Mary Had a Little Lamb," rescued the project by organizing a "Ladies' Fair" that raised $30,000. The monument was finally dedicated in 1843, with the now-aged Daniel Webster returning to speak again.

Over time, Brahmin Charlestown turned Irish and working class, and the monument featured in gritty crime movies like The Town, directed by Ben Affleck (who has also acquired the movie rights to Philbrick's book). But today the obelisk stands amid renovated townhouses, and the small park surrounding it is popular with exercise classes and leisure-seekers. "You'll be talking to visitors about the horrible battle that took place here," says park ranger Merrill Kohlhofer, "and all around you are sunbathers and Frisbee players and people walking their dogs." Firemen also visit, to train for climbing tall buildings by scaling the 221-foot monument.

Philbrick is drawn to a different feature of the park: a statue of what he calls the "wild man" and neglected hero of revolutionary Boston, Dr. Joseph Warren. The physician led the rebel underground and became major general of the colonial army in the lead-up to Bunker Hill. A flamboyant man, he addressed 5,000 Bostonians clad in a toga and went into the Bunker Hill battle wearing a silk-fringed waistcoat and silver buttons, "like Lord Falkland, in his wedding suit." But he refused to assume command, fighting as an ordinary soldier and dying from a bullet in the face during the final assault. Warren's stripped body was later identified on the basis of his false teeth, which had been crafted by Paul Revere. He left behind a fiancée (one of his patients) and a mistress he'd recently impregnated.

"Warren was young, charismatic, a risk-taker-a man made for revolution," Philbrick says. "Things were changing by the day and he embraced that." In death, Warren became the Revolution's first martyr, though he's little remembered by most Americans today.

***

Before leaving Charlestown, Philbrick seeks out one other site. In 1775, when Americans marched past Bunker Hill and fortified Breed's instead, a British map compounded the confusion by mixing up the two hills as well. Over time, the name Breed's melted away and the battle became indelibly linked to Bunker. But what of the hill that originally bore that name?

It's visible from the Bunker Hill Monument: a taller, steeper hill 600 yards away. But Charlestown's narrow, one-way streets keep carrying Philbrick in the wrong direction. After 15 minutes of circling his destination he finally finds a way up. "It's a pity the Americans didn't fortify this hill," he quips, "the British would never have found it."

It's now crowned by a church, on Bunker Hill Street, and a sign says the church was established in 1859, "On the Top of Bunker Hill." The church's business manager, Joan Rae, says the same. "This is Bunker Hill. That other hill's not. It's Breed's." To locals like Rae, perhaps, but not to visitors or even to Google Maps. Tap in "Bunker Hill Charlestown" and you'll be directed to...that other hill. To Philbrick, this enduring confusion is emblematic of the Bunker Hill story. "The whole thing's a screw-up," he says. "The Americans fortify the wrong hill, this forces a fight no one planned, the battle itself is an ugly and confused mess. And it ends with a British victory that's also a defeat."

Retreating to Boston for lunch at "ye olde" Union Oyster House, Philbrick reflects more personally on his historic exploration of the city where he was born. Though he was mostly raised in Pittsburgh, his forebears were among the first English settlers of the Boston area in the 1630s. One Philbrick served in the Revolution. As a championship sailor, Philbrick competed on the Charles River in college and later moved to Boston. He still has an apartment there, but mostly lives on the echt-Yankee island of Nantucket, the setting for his book about whaling, In the Heart of the Sea.

Philbrick, however, considers himself a "deracinated WASP" and doesn't believe genealogy or flag-waving should cloud our view of history. "I don't subscribe to the idea that the founders or anyone else were somehow better than us and that we have to live up to their example." He also feels the hated British troops in Boston deserve reappraisal. "They're an occupying army, locals despise them, and they don't want to be there," he says. "As Americans we've now been in that position in Iraq and can appreciate the British dilemma in a way that wasn't easy before."

But Philbrick also came away from his research with a powerful sense of the Revolution's significance. While visiting archives in England, he called on Lord Gage, a direct descendant of Gen. Thomas Gage, overall commander of the British military at the Bunker Hill battle. The Gage family's Tudor-era estate has 300 acres of private gardens and a chateau-style manor filled with suits of armor and paintings by Gainsborough, Raphael and Van Dyck.

"We had sherry and he could not have been more courteous," Philbrick says of Lord Gage. "But it was a reminder of the British class system and how much the Revolution changed our history. As countries, we've gone on different paths since his ancestor sent redcoats up that hill."

Read an excerpt from Philbrick's Bunker Hill, detailing the tarring and feathering of loyalist John Malcom on the eve of the Revolutionary War, here.

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The True Story of the Battle of Bunker Hill

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The last stop on Boston's Freedom Trail is a shrine to the fog of war. "Breed's Hill," a plaque reads. "Site of the Battle of Bunker Hill." Another plaque bears the famous order given American troops as the British charged up not-Bunker Hill. "Don't fire 'til you see the whites of their eyes."

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Facts, map, summary, importance

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The Battle of Bunker Hill was fought on June 17, 1775, during the Siege of Boston in the first stage of the American Revolutionary War. The battle is named after Bunker Hill in Charlestown, Massachusetts, which was peripherally involved in the... Wikipedia

Mar 3, 2020 · The 'Battle of Bunker Hill', which took place on June 17th 1775, was the first time New England ...Duration: 10:16
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Please click here if you are not redirected within a few seconds. The Battle of Bunker Hill was fought on June 17, 1775, during the Siege of Boston in the first stage of the American Revolutionary War. The battle is named after Bunker Hill in Charlestown, Massachusetts, which was peripherally involved in the...

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Introduction

To prevent British soldiers from conducting further attacks on the countryside after the march to Lexington and Concord, 20,000 provincial militiamen encircle Boston in the spring of 1775. The Charlestown peninsula and Dorchester Heights, commanding both the city of Boston and Boston harbor, lie abandoned. Hoping to make the British "masters of these heights," General Gage, in conference with Major Generals William Howe, Henry Clinton, and John Burgoyne, plans to seize the neglected positions before the colonists do so. News of Gage's intent filters across from Boston and down from New Hampshire on 15 June. Acting quickly on this intelligence, the Massachusetts Committee of Safety orders General Artemas Ward, commander of the colonial militia surrounding Boston, to race the British to the Charlestown peninsula, capture Bunker Hill, and then seize the Dorchester hills.

The following day, Ward orders Colonel William Prescott, with the aid of one thousand colonial troops, to take and fortify Bunker Hill. Unknown to the British, Prescott and his troops arrive at the Charlestown peninsula that same night. Prescott and other officers ultimately decide to bypass Bunker Hill, rising 110 feet and situated near the only route back to Cambridge, and instead give "orders to march" to Breed's Hill, a smaller mount further south and within cannon range of Boston and British ships in the harbor. The colonists toil industriously throughout the night and early morning to construct an earthen fort 160 feet long and 30 feet high atop the hill, with breastworks and a rail fence all the way down to the Mystic River.

Astonished British generals wake on the morning of 17 June to discover the newly erected defenses. As the day continues, British ships bombard the untrained militia as they work, and Colonel Prescott walks the bulwarks to raise morale. Thirsty and tired, the soldiers receive "no refreshment." Back in Boston, Gage summons a war council.

At three o'clock in the afternoon, over 2,000 British soldiers, commanded by General Howe and wearing flashing red coats, land on the Charlestown shore. Continental snipers fire at the British as they march, and General Howe orders a combustible shell launched on Charlestown. Amid smoke and flames, local inhabitants flee their homes in order to escape "Charlestown's dismal fate." From rooftops and hilltops, spectators watch Charlestown burn. The clear day affords views to residents as far off as Braintree, including Abigail Adams and an eight-year-old John Quincy Adams who later recalls living in "unintermitted danger."

British troops head uphill, where they are frustrated by fences, pits, and tall grass. In dust and heat, the continental militia wait behind their walls. They hold fire until the British are in within 150 feet of the redoubt. "Heavy and severe Fire" decimates the thick British ranks. Recoiling from the first attack, General Howe relies on "the Bravery of the King's Troops" and immediately orders his stumbling and disordered soldiers to make a second charge, this time only at the hill and rail fence. Again the colonists slaughter the King's troops with their fire.

An hour passes as the British recover from the two attacks. They receive 400 new troops from Boston. A third time, General Howe orders his soldiers, with the help of the reinforcements, to charge the breastworks and the rail fence. With "Bravery and Resolution," Prescott's men again wait until the last minute to open fire. This time, however, they are running short on ammunition and are soon overrun by the British, whom they fight with rocks and the butts of their muskets as they dodge the "Arrows of death."

No longer able to withstand the British attack, Prescott's men retreat north over the road to Cambridge, as General Stark's New Hampshire troops cover them in the rear. One of the last to abandon the fort on Breed's Hill, Joseph Warren is killed as he retreats, and he is mourned with "the tears of multitudes." In total, 140 colonists are dead and 271 are wounded. Before dark, the British again command the Charleston peninsula, though 226 British lie dead and 828 are wounded.

Despite renewed British control of the peninsula, colonial forces still trap the British in Boston. As supply issues and shortages plague them, the British prepare for further military commitment to defeat the "poor and ignorant" colonists. Meanwhile, the colonies scramble to assemble more soldiers. Britain replaces General Gage with General Howe in early October 1775, and two weeks after the battle at Breed's Hill, on 2 July 1775, George Washington arrives in Cambridge to take command of the Continental Army.

Click here to read a related essay on Bunker Hill by historian Bernard Bailyn.

List of supporting documents:

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To prevent British soldiers from conducting further attacks on the countryside after the march to Lexington and Concord, 20,000 provincial militiamen encircle Boston in the spring of 1775. The Charlestown peninsula and Dorchester Heights, commanding both the city of Boston and Boston harbor, lie abandoned.

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Battle of Lexington--British Soldier's first hand account

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Battle of Lexington--British Soldier's first hand account

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The Battle at Lexington Green, 1775 - the British Perspective

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A letter from a British soldier describes the shot heard ’round the world.

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Battle of Lexington:  Report from A Colonial Militiaman About What Happened At Lexington

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Battle of Lexington:  Report from A Colonial Militiaman About What Happened At Lexington

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Citation Information

Congress of the Confederation, "Deposition #8 of Nathanael Parkhurst, et al. Regarding the Events of April 18 and 19, 1775 at Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts Bay Colony," Digital Public Library of America, http://dp.la/item/d123dd700071976469a5e82c673f6d5e.

Note: These citations are programmatically generated and may be incomplete.

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A deposition of a colonial militiaman from the battle of Lexington and Concord, April 25, 1775.

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Citation Information Congress of the Confederation, "Deposition #8 of Nathanael Parkhurst, et al. Regarding the Events of April 18 and 19, 1775 at Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts Bay Colony," Digital Public Library of America, http://dp.la/item/d123dd700071976469a5e82c673f6d5e. Note: These citations are programmatically generated and may be incomplete.

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Lots of primary source documents about different aspects of the Revolutionary War.

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Primary Source Spotlight: American Revolution - Citizen U Primary Source Nexus

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American Revolution primary source set The American Revolution and Its Era: Maps and Charts collection Mapping the American Revolution and Its Era Battle maps and charts of the American Revolution (1881) Printed Ephemera 1763-1783 A broadside titled "No Stamped Paper to be had" reports a variety of colonial efforts intended to force the repeal of the hated [...]