Chapter 6- The American Revolution (1776-1783)
Lesson 1- The War for Independence
The Two Armies Face Off

• Both sides expected to win quickly

 
British Advantages

• Strongest navy in the world
• Well-trained army
• Wealth of a worldwide empire
• Larger population
• Patriots had no regular army and a weak navy
  • Lack of military experience and weapons
  • Militia groups fought for a short time and then went home
  • Some colonists were neutral or loyal to Britain

 
Loyalists in the Colonies

• At least 20% of the population were Loyalists or Tories
  • Many Loyalists in the Carolinas and Georgia
  • Not many Loyalists in New England
• Loyalists’ reasons
  • Depended on the British for jobs
  • Feared chaos
  • Didn’t understand why the colonies wanted independence
• British wanted slaves to fight for them
  • Royal governor of Virginia promised freedom to slaves who fought for the British
• Friends and families divided
  • Benjamin Franklin’s son had been royal governor of New Jersey

 
Advantages of the Patriots

• Fighting on their own ground
  • It took time and money for the British to ship soldiers and supplies across the Atlantic Ocean
• Greater motivation- fighting for freedom
  • British relied on Hessian mercenaries (hired soldiers)
• Washington’s courage and determination

 
The Continental Army

• Continental Congress served as the national government
  • No power to raise money through taxes
    • James Madison of Virginia called for a stronger government
  • Some Americans were unwilling to transfer power to the Continental Congress
    • Hard for Congress to get soldiers and raise money
• Depended on the states to recruit soldiers for the Continental Army
• Soldiers signed up for one year at first
  • Washington wanted longer terms
  • Eventually enlistments were offered for three years or the length of the war
    • Most still signed up for one year
• Lack of qualified military commanders
• Women in the war:
  • Margaret Corbin took the place of her husband after he died in battle
  • Mary Ludwig Hays McCauly (Molly Pitcher) carried water to the soldiers
  • Deborah Sampson dressed as a man and joined the army

 
Early Campaigns

• Britain sent 32,000 troops to New York in the summer of 1776
  • General William Howe hoped the size of his army would convince the Patriots to give up

 
Patriot Defeat on Long Island

• Battle of Long Island was late August 1776
  • Fewer than 20,000 troops for the Patriots
  • British outnumbered the Patriots and won
• Nathan Hale spied on British troops
  • Caught by the British and hanged
• Americans lacked shoes, socks, jackets, and blankets
• Washington retreated to Pennsylvania

 
A Low Point for the Patriots

• Many soldiers left the army by the winter
• Washington begged Congress for more troops
  • Wanted free African Americans, but Southern states did not want to give them guns

 
African Americans in Battle

• Some states started enlisting African Americans
  • Every state except for South Carolina by the end of the war
  • As many as 5,000 joined the Patriots
  • Peter Salem fought at Concord and Bunker Hill

 
The Battles of Trenton and Princeton

• Washington crossed the Delaware River and surprised the Hessian mercenaries on Christmas night 1776 and attacked the next day
• Washington defeated the British at Princeton

 
British Strategy

• British planned to take Albany and gain control of the Hudson River
  • Wanted to separate New England from the Middle Colonies
• Three-pronged plan:
  • General John Burgoyne would go south from Canada
  • Lieutenant Colonel Barry St. Leger would move east from Lake Ontario
  • General Howe would move north up the Hudson

 
The British Capture Philadelphia

• Howe wanted to take Philadelphia before going to Albany
  • Won battles near the city and then captured Philadelphia
    • The Continental Congress fled
• Howe decided to spend the winter in Philadelphia instead of going to Albany

 
The Battle of Saratoga

• Benedict Arnold’s troops stopped St. Leger at Fort Stanwix
• Burgoyne captured Fort Ticonderoga, but then had to retreat to Saratoga
• General Horatio Gates blocked and surrounded Burgoyne’s army
  • Burgoyne surrendered on October 17, 1777
• British plan to separate New England from the Middle Colonies had failed
• Changed the course of the war

 
Lesson 2- The War Continues
Gaining Allies

• Benjamin Franklin had been in Paris trying to get an alliance with France
  • France had been secretly providing money to the Americans
• Battle of Saratoga was a turning point in the war
  • Other nations realized that the US had a chance to win the war
• France declared war on Britain in February 1778
  • Sent money, equipment, and troops to aid the Americans
• Spain declared war on Britain in 1779
  • Fought the British in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida

 
Winter at Valley Forge

• British spent the winter in Philadelphia
• Washington set up camp at Valley Forge
  • Lacked food, clothing, shoes, shelter, and medicine
  • Troops built huts and gathered supplies
  • Volunteers made clothes and took care of the sick
  • Many soldiers got sick and died
  • Some deserted (left without permission)
• Continental Army survived the winter
  • New soldiers joined
  • Washington told the troops about France’s help in April

 
Foreigners Help on the Battlefield

• Marquis de Lafayette came from France to help the Americans
  • Became a trusted aide to Washington
• Thaddeus Kosciusko and Casimir Pulaski came from Poland to help
• Friedrich von Steuben came from Prussia
  • Trained the Patriot troops at Valley Forge
• Juan de Miralles came from Spain and helped raise money
  • The Continental Army still needed lots of money

 
Life on the Home Front

• Women took over the responsibilities of their husbands at home

 
Problems in the Economy

• Congress had no power to raise money through taxes
  • Got some money from the states and foreign countries (not enough)
• Lots of paper money printed
  • Lost its value
  • Inflation- when it takes more and more money to buy the same amount of goods
    • Congress stopped printing paper money

 
New Ways of Thinking

• Women questioned their place in society
  • Abigail Adams told her husband arguing for more rights for women

 
Questioning Slavery

• Some people started questioning slavery
• Governor William Livingston of New Jersey asked his government to free all slaves in the state
• African Americans asked the legislature of New Hampshire for freedom
• African Americans fought in many battles for the Americans
• Pennsylvania legislature adopted a plan to gradually free slaves in 1780
  • Other northern states followed

 
Treatment of Loyalists

• Thousands of Loyalists fought on the side of the British
• Some spied on the Patriots
• Many fled to England or Florida
• Loyalists who stayed faced violence and could be arrested and possibly executed

 
Lesson 3- Battlegrounds Shift
Fighting in the West

• Most Native Americans sided with the British
  • British presented less of a threat than Americans
  • Mohawk chief Joseph Brant led attacks on American settlements in southwestern New York and northern Pennsylvania
• Henry Hamilton commanded Detroit, the main British base in the West
  • Paid Native Americans for settlers’ scalps
• George Rogers Clark led the Patriots in capturing the British post at Kaskaskia and the town of Vincennes in 1778
  • Vincennes retaken for the British by Henry Hamilton
    • Taken back by Clark in February 1779
• American position in the West strengthened

 
The War at Sea

• British blockade (measure that keeps ships from entering or leaving a harbor) prevented supplies and troops from reaching the Continental Army

 
Privateers

• Continental Congress ordered the construction of 13 warships
  • Only two sailed to sea
    • Others captured by the British
• American navy too weak to operate effectively
• About 2,000 privateers (privately owned merchants ships with weapons) captured many British ships

 
An American Naval Hero

• John Paul Jones raided British ports
• Sailed on the Bonhomme Richard
  • Defeated the Serapis in 1779
    • “I have not yet begun to fight.”

 
Fighting in the South

• Americans won the Battle of Moore’s Creek (North Carolina) and saved Charles Town from the British
• British realized winning the war would not be easy by 1778
  • New British plan:
    • Focused on the South (many Loyalists)
    • British sea power and support of Loyalists would help them win in the South
    • Worked at first

 
Early British Success

• British took Savannah, Georgia, in 1778
  • Took control of most of the state
• Henry Clinton attacked Charles Town, South Carolina, in 1780
  • Worst American defeat of the war
• Clinton went to New York
• General Charles Cornwallis left in command in the South
  • Fought General Horatio Gates at Camden, South Carolina
    • British won, but Cornwallis could not control the area he had conquered

 
Hit-and-Run Tactics

• British didn’t get much help from Loyalists in the South
• Small forces of Patriots attacked suddenly and then disappeared to catch the British off guard
  • Francis Marion (Swamp Fox) operated out of swamps in South Carolina

 
Spain’s Help

• Spanish Governor of Louisiana Bernardo de Gálvez had supplies and ammunition shipped up the Mississippi River to American troops
  • Helped George Rogers Clark capture Kaskaskia and Vincennes
• Gálvez raised an army to fight the British
  • Drove them out of the Gulf of Mexico region

 
American Successes

• British warned people in the Carolinas to give up the fight for independence and join the British
• Americans won at Kings Mountain
  • More support for independence from Southerners
• Nathanael Greene replaced Gates as commander of the Continental forces in the South in 1780
  • Split his army in two
    • One section defeated the British at Cowpens, South Carolina
    • Another section joined Francis Marion’s raids
• Green combined his forces and fought Cornwallis’s army at Guilford Courthouse in North Carolina
  • British won, but suffered great losses
    • Cornwallis abandoned the Carolina campaign

 
Cornwallis Retreats

• Cornwallis went north to Virginia in April 1781
  • Carried out raids throughout the region
• Washington sent Lafayette and General Anthony Wayne to fight Cornwallis
  • Cornwallis took shelter at Yorktown

 
Lesson 4- The Final Years
Victory at Yorktown

• French warships arrived off Newport, Rhode Island in July 1780
  • Thousands of soldiers commanded by Comte de Rochambeau
    • Joined Washington North of New York City
• Washington waited for a second fleet of French ships before he would attack the British in New York
  • Second fleet never arrived in the North

 
Washington Leaves for Virginia

• Washington sent Lafayette and Anthony Wayne to Virginia to stop Cornwallis
  • Trapped Cornwallis at Yorktown (a peninsula)
• Washington found out that the French fleet was heading toward Chesapeake Bay
  • Washington decided to attack the British at Yorktown instead of New York
    • Kept his new strategy secret so that Clinton couldn’t help Cornwallis
• Three groups met at Yorktown
  • Lafayette’s troops
  • Washington’s/Rochambeau’s army
  • French fleet

 
A Trap at Yorktown

• 14,000 American and French troops vs. 8,000 British and Hessian troops at Yorktown
  • French fleet kept Cornwallis from escaping by sea
• American and British forces began a siege (an attempt to force surrender by blocking the movement of people or goods into or out of a place)

 
Victory Over Cornwallis

• British supplies were low
  • Many soldiers wounded or sick
• Alexander Hamilton led an attack that captured key British defenses
• Cornwallis surrendered on October 19, 1781

 
Independence Achieved

• Some fighting after Yorktown, but the British were convinced that the war was too costly
• Treaty of Paris signed on September 3, 1783
  • Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and John Jay represented the US
  • Already ratified (approved officially) by Congress
  • Great Britain recognized the US as an independent nation
  • British promised to withdraw all troops from American territory and gave Americans the right to fish off the coast of Canada
  • US agreed that Americans would pay to British merchants what they owed and that Congress would advise the states to return property taken from loyalists

 
A Conspiracy Against Congress

• Washington kept his army in Newburgh, New York
  • Soldiers were upset about not being paid by Congress
  • Some officers wanted to use force against Congress if their demands weren’t met
• Washington worried that a revolt could destroy the new nation
  • Asked the soldiers to be patient and urged Congress to meet their demands
    • Congress agreed

 
Washington Returns Home

• British troops left in November 1783
• Washington went to Congress to resign
  • Returned home to Mount Vernon
    • Planned to live quietly with his family

 
Why the Americans Won

• American advantages:
  • Fought on their own land
  • British troops and supplies had to cross an ocean
  • Americans knew the land and where to ambush (surprise attack)
    • Experts at wilderness fighting
    • British couldn't control the countryside
  • Help from other countries
  • Determination and spirit of the Patriots
• Ideas of the American Revolution inspired people in other parts of the world
  • French rebels fought in defense of “Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity” in 1789
  • Slave revolution led by Toussaint L’Ouverture in Saint Domingue (Haiti) in 1791
    • Second nation in the Americas to achieve independence (1804)