Revolutionary War

232 Pages·2010·35.791 MB·English

by  Benton Minks, Louise Minks, John S. Bowman

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Revolutionary War, Revised Edition
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World War II, Revised Edition
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RevolutionaRy
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Revised edition
Benton Minks and Louise Minks
John s. BowMan
general editor
Revolutionary War, Revised Edition
Copyright © 2010, 2003, 1992 by Benton Minks and Louise Minks
Maps copyright © 2010, 2003 by Infobase Publishing
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Minks, Benton.
Revolutionary war / Benton Minks and Louise Minks ; John S. Bowman,
general editor. — Rev. ed.
p. cm.
Summary: A narrative account of the American Revolution, covering the origins of
disputes with Britain, profiles of the key figures, and descriptions of major battles.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8160-8196-7 (hc : alk. paper); ISBN 978-1-4381-3198-6 (e-book)
1. United States—History—Revolution, 1775–1783. I. Minks, Louise. II. Bowman,
John S. III. Title.
E208.M53 2010
973.3—dc22 2009044102
Chelsea House books are available at special discounts when purchased in bulk
quantities for businesses, associations, institutions, or sales promotions. Please call
our Special Sales Department in New York at [phone] or [phone].
You can find Chelsea House on the World Wide Web at http://www.chelseahouse.com
Text design by Erika K. Arroyo
Cover design by Takeshi Takahashi
Composition by Hermitage Publishing Services
Cover printed by Bang Printing, Brainerd, Minn.
Book printed and bound by Bang Printing, Brainerd, Minn.
Date printed: September 2010
Printed in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
h h h
NotE oN Photos
Many of the illustrations and photographs used in this book are old, historical images.
The quality of the prints is not always up to modern standards, as in some cases the
originals are from glass negatives or are damaged. The content of the illustrations,
however, made their inclusion important despite problems in reproduction.
Contents
Preface vii
1
   HOLDING THE LINE ON 
BREED’S HILL, 1775  1
Dr. Joseph Warren: committed revolutionary 5
2
  UNDERCURRENTS OF RESISTANCE  7
Hoeing Different rows: New england Yeoman and
Southern Planter 8
Pre-revolutionary america, 1763 12
Stamps and the revolution 13
3
 A MASSACRE AND A TEA PARTY  20
Thirteen colonies, 1774 24
Thriving colonial Trade Patterns 29
4
  MINUTEMEN AND MOUNTAIN BOYS  34
Paul revere: artist and Patriot 36
Battle of Bunker Hill and the Siege of Boston,
June 1775–March 1776 44
forts Designed for Security 46
5
 THE FIRST CAMPAIGNS  50
Major Battles of the revolutionary War, 1775–1777 51
Two colonial cities: Boston and Quebec 59
campaign in canada, 1775–1776 61
Struggle for New York, 1776 67
6
  RING OUT LIBERTY!  72
a Just War? 80
Slavery throughout the colonies 85
xiv-218_AAW-RevolutWar.indd 5 8/23/10 1:22 PM
7
washinGton in ChaRGe 89
Camp Life for Colonial Troops 95
8
FiRe and BLood aCRoss
the FRontieR 103
Campaigns in New York State, 1777 104
The Tale of Jane McCrea 106
Spilling over the Mountains: Frontier Expansion
after 1763 111
George Rogers Clark’s Campaign, 1778–1779 114
9
ManeuVeRs at sea 116
Learning the Ropes: Commanding the Navy 121
John Paul Jones’s Cruise and Battle with Serapis, 1779 125
10
MoneY, MutinY, and MoRaLe 129
Major Battles of the Revolutionary War, 1778–1782 130
The Life of Venture Smith 133
Molly Brant and the Iroquois 138
11
“the woRLd tuRned uPside down” 144
Invasion of the Iroquois Homelands during
the American Revolution, 1779 145
Charleston: Doorway to the South 149
Siege of Yorktown, September 28–October 18, 1781 156
12
weaPons and taCtiCs 161
Pat Ferguson and His Rifle 166
Gunpowder 176
13
GLoRious tRiuMPh 179
North America, 1783 180
A New Nation in the World 188
GLOSSARY 192
FURTHER READING 197
INDEx 202
Preface
The American Revolution was a stunning event for its time and
remains so today. Emerging nations around the globe still look to the
Revolution as a model. They are impressed with its democratic ideals
and the constitution that it inspired. Its many stories of individual sac-
rifice and dedication remain uncorrupted, even though new inquiries
and interpretations continue to be written more than 235 years later.
This book traces the building blocks leading toward revolution and
the events of the war itself. It also explains how a young and disparate
collection of colonies could take on the greatest empire and military
power in the world and emerge victorious.
By 1776, only 13 years had passed since the Treaty of Paris in 1763.
The treaty officially ended 100 years of hostilities between Great Brit-
ain and France. Terms of the treaty awarded Britain all of present-day
Canada as well as all of the land east of the Mississippi River. Britain
had conquered a territory many times the size of its island kingdom,
but at a great price. The country’s treasury was nearly bankrupt, and
its soldiers were exhausted.
Once the French and Indian War ended in 1763, many of the British
soldiers stayed behind to occupy the American colonies and help enforce
English laws. Claiming the vast new North American territory was
cause for British satisfaction and pride. The truth was, however, that the
English were facing a problem they did not know how to manage. That
problem was how to keep the American colonists under their control.
This account of the Revolution examines the impact of this newly
acquired territory on the American colonies and their decision to go
to war so soon after the French and Indian War. At first, Great Brit-
ain assumed it could expect the loyal allegiance of American farmers,
merchants, tradespeople, and even politicians. After all, had not the
homeland just completed a long and destructive campaign to protect
them? The colonists should be grateful for the great victory England
had won on their behalf.
vii
viii RevolutionaRy WaR
King George III and the British parliament miscalculated, how-
ever. True, the average working-class person in the American colonies
recognized his or her historical and economic ties to Britain. These
common folk and some of their leaders were not happy, though, with
the prospects of being controlled by a government located across the
ocean in Europe. The American colonists remembered that without
their help, the British would not have succeeded in defeating the
French. Men from Massachusetts, New York, Vermont, and Connecti-
cut fought alongside the British. They had become seasoned warriors
in their own right. The farmers and merchants of most of the northern
colonies had helped provide food and other supplies for British troops
and their officers. Many of those colonial citizens and their leaders felt
they were perfectly capable of tending their own domestic affairs and
did not need the opinions and direction of king or Parliament.
This book shows how this spirit of colonial self-reliance was
regarded by the British as impertinence, even arrogance. The British
government had no tolerance for any sentiment in the colonies that
did not conform to Britain’s ambitions for the new territory it had con-
quered. Perhaps Britain’s gravest mistake, though, was its decision to
assume it had a right to control the great wealth emerging from North
America. Britain maintained complete control of commerce between
the colonies and other markets besides itself. It continued to reap the
bulk of the benefits of this new world of astonishing resources and
markets for its own goods. This volume explores the trade patterns
between the American colonies and the rest of the world. It clarifies
why it was in colonial interest to break from the British Empire and
reap the rewards of such rich commerce themselves.
A primary British method to control growth and development in
the colonies was taxation. The early frustration and rage the colonists
felt toward England occurred because of attempts to regulate increas-
ing prosperity. Ordinary, hardworking residents of the colonies were
not far removed from their ancestors. They remembered that one of
the principal motives for leaving England and risking a new livelihood
in a hard and undeveloped new world was to escape the rigid control
of English laws and regulations. Most despised were those rules that
affected the colonists’ chances for improving their lives. It was unwise
to threaten a shopkeeper trying to improve his family’s future in Phila-
delphia or a yeoman farmer battling stony fields and poor climate in
Connecticut. Such working-class folk in this colonial venture were
Preface ix
willing to be patient to improve their prospects for a better life, but
they had little patience with a government across the ocean that acted
as though it were entitled to profit from their hard work.
With England’s uncompromising determination to maintain eco-
nomic and political control, resistance became more frequent and
more public. As war became a possibility, many ordinary people
became apprehensive. Not everyone, by any means, was happy about
the prospect of separating from England. Even in rebellious Boston,
before the British evacuated the city, it was risky for a colonist to openly
side with the rebellion if he knew his neighbors opposed the war. Most
colonial families were originally from Britain, and many of them still
had family ties to the island nation.
When George Washington agreed to lead the Continental army,
he was faced with enormous logistical problems, such as feeding and
outfitting his troops. A larger threat to his plans was the low morale
of men who left their homes and agreed to fight for almost nothing.
Some feared the consequences of inflaming the world’s strongest mili-
tary power at the time. Many of the volunteers faced hostilities from
their own families. For example, Benjamin Franklin was too old to
fight himself, but he could not persuade his own son to support the
Revolution.
Many conventional histories of the Revolutionary War tend to
provide an oversimplified version that makes it seem as though all the
colonists enthusiastically joined in a struggle for independence. In fact,
as this account makes clear, throughout the colonies, especially in the
early months of the war, many colonial families stayed loyal to the Brit-
ish Crown. These Loyalists saw themselves as English first and colonial
Americans second. They were very skeptical that a new American
government would be any improvement over rule by the Crown and
Parliament. In addition to their feeling that open rebellion was a hope-
less mistake, Loyalists were certain that the infant Continental army
had little chance of success. Then there would be a terrible price to pay
for anyone who had supported the Patriot cause. Some citizens tried to
live between both sides, acting in a neutral manner but being extremely
skeptical that the Americans could possibly win the war. True Loyal-
ists openly supported the Crown, fought alongside British regulars and
served as spies. If a Loyalist family could not stay within British lines
for safety and comfort, it might flee to Canada or even back to Britain