About 250,000 American men served as regulars or as militia for the revolutionary cause over eight years during wartime, but there were never more than 90,000 men under arms at any time. Washington had rallied Charles Lee's broken regiments, the Continentals repulsed British bayonet charges, the British rear guard lost perhaps 50 per-cent more casualties, and the Americans held the field at the end of the day. The last British occupation of New York City ended on November 25, 1783, with the departure of Clinton's replacement, General Sir Guy Carleton. If she neglected it, if fear overcame duty, she would add debasement to humiliation, and become an object of contempt to her own century and to all future peoples". [300][af] About 55,000 sailors served aboard American privateers during the war. [354], A Loyalist militia unitthe British Legionprovided some of the best troops in British service; it received a commission in the British Army. In 1777, the British were still in excellent position to quell the rebellion. This article is about military actions primarily. [345] Desertion among the Germans occurred throughout the war, with the highest rate of desertion occurring during the time between the surrender at Yorktown and the Treaty of Paris. Twenty percent of Britain's German auxiliaries employed in North America were from. The war became a stalemate in the north in 1779, so the British initiated their southern strategy, which aimed to mobilize Loyalist support in the region and occupy American patriot-controlled territory north to Chesapeake Bay. [179], Like his predecessors, French foreign minister Vergennes considered the 1763 Peace a national humiliation and viewed the war as an opportunity to weaken Britain. Reinforcements had to come from Europe, and maintaining large armies over such distances was extremely complex; ships could take three months to cross the Atlantic, and orders from London were often outdated by the time they arrived. While external affairs were managed by London, colonial militia were funded locally but with the ending of the French threat in 1763, the legislatures expected less taxation, not more. [169] Washington attacked them on October 4, but was repulsed. In 1779, Spain also allied with France against Britain in the Treaty of Aranjuez, though Spain did not formally ally with the Americans. King George III feared that the war's prospects would make it unlikely he could reclaim the North American colonies. [369] In November 1775, Lord Dunmore, the royal governor of Virginia, issued a proclamation that promised freedom to any Patriot-owned slaves willing to bear arms. The American Revolutionary War was a war fought between Great Britain and the original Thirteen Colonies in North America from 1775 to 1783. [98], Beginning in August 1775, American privateers raided towns in Nova Scotia, including Saint John, Charlottetown, and Yarmouth. [405], As directed by a Congressional resolution of May 26, 1783, all non-commissioned officers and enlisted were furloughed "to their homes" until the "definitive treaty of peace", when they would be automatically discharged. [79], When the British began probing the backcountry in 17771778, they were faced with a major problem: any significant level of organized Loyalist activity required a continued presence of British regulars. [82], The Revolutionary War included two principal campaign theaters within the Thirteen Colonies, and a smaller but strategically important third one west of the Appalachian Mountains. Britain hoped that the Loyalists would do much of the fighting, but found that the Loyalists did not engage as significantly as they had hoped. [138] Loyalist activity surged in the wake of the American defeat, especially in New York state. [288] After the Battle of Monmouth, Washington came to realize that saving entire towns was not necessary, but preserving his army and keeping the revolutionary spirit alive was more important. [50] The Massacre coincided with the partial repeal of the Townshend Acts by the Tory-based North Ministry, which came to power in January 1770 and remained in office until 1781. For origins and aftermath, see, Toggle Strategy and commanders subsection, Toggle Revolution as civil war subsection, Toggle Britain's "American war" and peace subsection. He recruited a Loyalist militia of nearly 1,100, many of whom allegedly joined only after Campbell threatened to confiscate their property. It issued a declaration of the rights due every citizen, including life, liberty, property, assembly and trial by jury. . As was typical in wars of the era, diseases such as smallpox claimed more lives than battle. [397] Both parties tried to negotiate a settlement with Britain excluding the Americans; France proposed setting the western boundary of the US along the Appalachians, matching the British 1763 Proclamation Line. [95] In early March 1776, Colonel Henry Knox arrived with heavy artillery acquired in the Capture of Fort Ticonderoga. Claiming illness, the British general sent his deputy, Charles OHara, to surrender; after OHara approached Rochambeau to surrender his sword (the Frenchman deferred to Washington), Washington gave the nod to his own deputy, Benjamin Lincoln, who accepted it. [234], When the early war policy was administered by General William Howe, the Crown's need to maintain Loyalist support prevented it from using the traditional revolt suppression methods. When the first German troops arrived on Staten Island in August 1776, Congress approved the printing of handbills, promising land and citizenship to any willing to join the Patriot cause. [185] Talks progressed slowly until October 1777, when British defeat at Saratoga and their apparent willingness to negotiate peace convinced Vergennes only a permanent alliance could prevent the "disaster" of Anglo-American rapprochement. [57][u] Expecting concessions by the North administration, Congress authorized the extralegal committees and conventions of the colonial legislatures to enforce the boycott; this succeeded in reducing British imports by 97% from 1774 to 1775. As the Revolutionary War formally launched, Washington's forces drove the British army out of Boston during the Siege of Boston in March 1776, and British commander in chief William Howe responded by launching the New York and New Jersey campaign. France provided the Continental Army with informal economic and military support from the beginning of the war. [56] However, after some debate, on September 17, 1774, Congress endorsed the Massachusetts Suffolk Resolves and on October 20 passed the Continental Association; based on a draft prepared by the First Virginia Convention in August, the association instituted economic sanctions and a full boycott of goods against Britain. The body of historical writings on the American Revolution cite many motivations for the Patriot revolt that ultimately led to the nation's independence and establishment. Two Treatises of Government has long been cited as a major influence on Revolutionary-era American thinking, but historians David Lundberg and Henry F. May contend that Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding was far more widely read than were his political Treatises. Had it not been for a variety of mistakes, they probably could have won the war. [324] Many of his decisions were attributed to supply problems, such as the delay in launching the New York campaign and failure to pursue Washington's beaten army. A banking crisis led to the near-collapse of the East India Company, which dominated the British economy; to support it, Parliament passed the Tea Act, giving it a trading monopoly in the Thirteen Colonies. After the British gained victory over the French in the Seven Years' War in 1763, tensions and disputes arose between Britain and the colonies over policies related to trade, trans-Appalachian settlement, and taxation, including the Stamp and Townshend Acts. The campaign was initially successful, with the British capture of Charleston being a major setback for southern Patriots; however, a Franco-American force surrounded the British army at Yorktown and their surrender in October 1781 effectively ended fighting in America. Over time, the Continental Army established its military credibility, defeating or holding their own against British regulars and their hired Hessians known to all European great powers. [338], Unlike previous wars their use led to intense political debate in Britain, France, and even Germany, where Frederick the Great refused to provide passage through his territories for troops hired for the American war. Knowing they were up against overwhelming odds, Washington ordered the assembly of a war council on August 29; all agreed to retreat to Manhattan. [121][v] When Washington was driven off Long Island, he soon realized that he would need more than military might and amateur spies to defeat the British. [12][ar], The American Revolution established the United States with its numerous civil liberties and set an example to overthrow both monarchy and colonial governments. [417][ap], A British report in 1781 puts their total Army deaths at 6,046 in North America (17751779). [150], After his success at Princeton, Washington entered winter quarters at Morristown, New Jersey, where he remained until May[151] and received Congressional direction to inoculate all patriot troops against smallpox. The Battles of Lexington and Concord, fought on April 19, 1775, were the first military clashes of the American Revolutionary War. During the war, American patriot forces eventually gained the support by the Kingdom of France and the Kingdom of Spain. A joint attack on the British at Newport, Rhode Island, in late July failed, and for the most part the war settled into a stalemate phase in the North. There were several reasons for this, including public sympathy for the Patriot cause, an historical reluctance to expand the British army and the time needed to recruit and train new regiments. [374], Black Patriots were barred from the Continental Army until Washington convinced Congress in January 1778 that there was no other way to replace losses from disease and desertion. As France had nothing to gain from the colonies reconciling with Britain, Congress had three choices; making peace on British terms, continuing the struggle on their own, or proclaiming independence, guaranteed by France. Instead, Vergennes persuaded Louis XVI to secretly fund a government front company to purchase munitions for the Patriots, carried in neutral Dutch ships and imported through Sint Eustatius in the Caribbean. Defending Savannah was a force of more than 3,000 men under the command of General Augustine Prevost. Although victorious, Cornwallis suffered heavy casualties and retreated to Wilmington, North Carolina seeking supplies and reinforcements. [370], The 1779 Philipsburg Proclamation issued by Clinton extended the offer of freedom to Patriot-owned slaves throughout the colonies. The American Revolutionary War thus began as a civil conflict within the British Empire over colonial affairs, but, with America being joined by France in 1778 and Spain in 1779, it became an international war. [222] After Congress rejected the Carlisle Peace Commission in 1778 and Westminster turned to "hard war" during Clinton's command, neutral colonists in the Carolinas often allied with the Patriots whenever brutal combat broke out between Tories and Whigs. [100] Aware of Native American leanings toward the British and fearing an Anglo-Indian attack from Canada, Congress authorized a second invasion in April 1775. Dale Watson The American Revolution Experience From drummer boys, military mapmakers and other ordinary people, explore the lives of 13 men and women who witnessed the dawn of a new nation. Since the 1760s, Franklin had been an organizer of British American inter-colony cooperation, and then served as a colonial lobbyist to Parliament in London. Overview Until the end of the Seven Years' War in 1763, few colonists in British North America objected to their place in the British Empire. When fully assembled, the Allied force numbered over 5,000 men. [425], Although the Revolution eliminated many forms of inequality, it did little to change the status of women, despite the role they played in winning independence. George III reluctantly accepted and the new government took office on March 27, 1782; however, Rockingham died unexpectedly on July 1, and was replaced by Lord Shelburne who acknowledged American independence. [219], Germain accordingly ordered Augustine Prvost, the British commander in East Florida, to advance into Georgia in December 1778. Articles with the HISTORY.com Editors byline have been written or edited by the HISTORY.com editors, including Amanda Onion, Missy Sullivan, Matt Mullen and Christian Zapata. Cornwallis attempted to resupply the garrison, but failed and was forced to surrender in October. When did the American Revolution begin? [155], The 1776 campaign demonstrated that regaining New England would be a prolonged affair, which led to a change in British strategy. Estimates of numbers vary, one suggestion being the population as a whole was split evenly between committed Patriots, committed Loyalists, and those who were indifferent. From the 1820s until the start of the U.S. Civil War, abolitionists called on the federal government to prohibit the ownership of people in the Southern states. The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was the military conflict of the American Revolution in which American Patriot forces under George Washington's command defeated the British, establishing and securing the independence of the United States. [277][ad], Washington designed the overall military strategy of the Revolutionary War in cooperation with Congress, established the principle of civilian supremacy in military affairs, personally recruited his senior officer corps, and kept the states focused on a common goal. Indeed, until the early 1760s, the British mostly left their American colonies alone. quoted from the Declarations and Resolves of the First Continental Congress October 14, 1774. Many of them lived among large plantation owners in the Tidewater region and South Carolina who produced cash crops in tobacco and indigo comparable to global markets in Caribbean sugar. [ac] Native American allies of the British and some freed blacks were left to escape unaided through the American lines. The British and Loyalist forces also included Hessian soldiers from Germany. Supported by a French army commanded by General Jean Baptiste de Rochambeau, Washington moved against Yorktown with a total of around 14,000 soldiers, while a fleet of 36 French warships offshore prevented British reinforcement or evacuation. That midnight, the newly installed Clinton continued his retreat to New York. [217] Arnold escaped to New York and switched sides, an action justified in a pamphlet addressed "To the Inhabitants of America"; the Patriots condemned his betrayal, while he found himself almost as unpopular with the British. He was committed to professionalizing military intelligence. The general daringly led his men across the icy Delaware River and on a ten-mile march into Trenton, New Jersey, where they surprised a garrison of 1,500 Hessians. ", "Sybil Ludington, Possible Female Paul Revere", "The American Revolution and the Black Loyalist Exodus", "Naval Power, Strategy and Foreign Policy, 17751791", "To become again our brethren': Desertion and community during the American Revolutionary War, 177583", "Jean Baptiste Donatien De Vimeur Rochambeau", "That time when Spanish New Orleans helped America win independence", "A Very Large British Military Investment for Very Little Practical Profit", "Revolutionary Spies: Women Spies of the American Revolution", "Losses of the Military and Naval Forces Engaged in the War of the American Revolution", "Jean-Baptiste-Donatien de Vimeur, Count de Rochambeau", "Naval Resources and the British Defeat at Yorktown, 1781", "America's Spanish Savior: Bernardo de Glvez", "Massacre or Myth? With civil war spreading from the Vende and hostile armies surrounding France on all sides, the Revolutionary government decided to make "Terror" the order of the day (September 5 . [387], When the commissioners returned to London in November 1778, they recommended a change in policy. On the lives of loyalists after the war The fighting actually continued, in the backcountry of the South in particular. [196], The British government failed to take into account the strength of the American merchant marine and support from European countries, which allowed the colonies to import munitions and continue trading with relative impunity. The Virginia General Assembly later cited her bravery: she fought while dressed as a man and "performed extraordinary military services, and received a severe wound at the battle of Germantown with the courage of a soldier". [229] In early October, Ferguson was defeated at the Battle of Kings Mountain, dispersing organized Loyalist resistance in the region. [103] A second defeat at Trois-Rivires on June 8 ended operations in Quebec. From 1775 to 1776, the committee shared information and built alliances through secret correspondence, as well as employing secret agents in Europe to gather intelligence, conduct undercover operations, analyze foreign publications, and initiate Patriot propaganda campaigns. Provided by British sympathizers, these were smuggled into North America from London by George Merchant, a recently released American prisoner. The final elements for US victory over Britain and US independence was assured by direct military intervention from France, as well as ongoing French supply and commercial trade over the final three years of the war. In the South, the British occupied Georgia by early 1779 and captured Charleston, South Carolina in May 1780. Beginning in 1787, he received pay as Spanish Agent 13, and subsequently expanded his efforts to persuade American settlers west of the Appalachian Mountains to secede from the United States, first in the Washington administration and later again in the Jefferson administration. [282] For the first three years until after fall of Philadelphia and the six-month encampment at Valley Forge, the Continental Army was largely supplemented by local state militias. The Spanish suggested additional concessions in the vital Mississippi River Basin, but required the cession of Georgia in violation of the Franco-American alliance. Thomas Jefferson estimated that Virginia may have lost 30,000 slaves in total escapes. Washington wanted to attack the British in New York, and Rochambeau wanted to attack them in Virginia, where Cornwallis' forces were less established and arguably easier to defeat. Hopkins captured large stores of powder and other munitions that was so great he had to impress an extra ship in the harbor to transport the supplies back home, when he departed on March 17. [245], On May 25, 1780, British Colonel Henry Bird invaded Kentucky as part of a wider operation to clear American resistance from Quebec to the Gulf Coast. Also includes the main warships on both sides, and all the important battles. [317] The bulk of military resources in the Americas were focused on defending sugar islands in the Caribbean; Jamaica alone generated more revenue than all thirteen American colonies combined. [213] Morale was poor, public support fell away in the long war, the Continental dollar was virtually worthless, the army was plagued with supply problems, desertion was common, and mutinies occurred in the Pennsylvania Line and New Jersey Line regiments over the conditions in early 1780. [270], To win their insurrection, Washington and the Continental Army needed to outlast the British will to continue the fight. The British responded by repealing earlier taxation measures. [416][ao] The Spanish lost a total of 124 killed and 247 wounded in West Florida. The War ended on January 14, 1784 when Congress ratified the peace treaty signed in Paris on September 3, 1783. [337] Sir Henry Clinton recommended recruiting Russian troops whom he rated very highly, having seen them in action against the Ottomans; however, negotiations with Catherine the Great made little progress. [115], A shortage of gunpowder led Congress to authorize a naval expedition against The Bahamas to secure ordnance stored there. The two victories helped convince the French that the Americans were worthy military allies. [331] After the surrender at Yorktown, Clinton was relieved by Carleton, whose major task was to oversee the evacuation of Loyalists and British troops from Savannah, Charleston, and New York City. The majority of the latter died while prisoners of war of the British, mostly in the prison ships in New York Harbor. [407], Of the European powers with American colonies adjacent to the newly created United States, Spain was most threatened by American independence, and it was correspondingly the most hostile to it. In Georgia, the Carolinas and much of Virginia, the vaunted war for liberty was, from the spring of . The American prisoners were subsequently sent to the. Fighting began at the Battle of Lexington on April 19, 1775. [209] Clinton unsuccessfully tried to tempt Washington into a decisive engagement by sending General William Tryon to raid Connecticut. British troops, however, were not to evacuate until a prisoner of war exchange occurred, an effort that involved much negotiation and would take some seven months to effect. The first was a colonial conflict in which objections to imperial trade regulation were as significant as taxation policy. For example, throughout the war Martha Washington was known to visit and provide aid to her husband George at various American camps,[359] and Frederika Charlotte Riedesel documented the Saratoga campaign. . [385], British negotiators now proposed a second peace settlement to Congress. [197] Traditional British policy was to employ European land-based allies to divert the opposition, a role filled by Prussia in the Seven Years' War; in 1778, they were diplomatically isolated and faced war on multiple fronts. [325] Having lost the confidence of his subordinates, he was recalled after Burgoyne surrendered at Saratoga. An attempt by the Royal Navy to take the forts in the October 20 to 22 Battle of Red Bank failed;[171][172] a second attack captured Fort Mifflin on November 16, while Fort Mercer was abandoned two days later when Cornwallis breached the walls.
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