(1775-1783) Following the end of the French and Indian War in 1763, British restrictions on westward expansion and trade as well as heavy taxation and the arbitrary administration of justice in the American colonies stirred the desire for redress among the American colonists, some of whom even began to think of independence and to organize to achieve that goal. On September 5, 1774, the colonists convened the First Continental Congress and petitioned King George III for relief to no avail. In Massachusetts, avid “patriots” seized control of provincial armories. An attempt by British forces under Gen. Thomas Gage to recover the seized weapons resulted in a clash between British troops and American patriots at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, and the rebellion quickly spread throughout New England. The Second Continental Congress convened on May 10, 1775, and attempted to restore relations with the Crown but recognized the need to control the growing rebellion and thus began to raise an army, appointed George Washington as commander-in-chief, and sought an alliance with France. Relations with the mother country deteriorated rapidly, an American army was dispatched to invade Canada, and some 20, 000 New England militiamen laid siege to the British forces in Boston (June 15, 1775) and demonstrated their commitment and fighting abilities in the Battle of Bunker (actually Breed's) Hill (June 17, 1775). The British acted swiftly to subdue the rebellion by sending additional land and naval forces to North America, but despite being outnumbered and ill-equipped, the American patriots conducted a spirited if often unsuccessful defense of their homes and liberties. The British forces evacuated Boston on March 17, 1776, but the American invasion of Canada launched in June 1775 failed in the summer of 1776. Even as Gen. Washington struggled to transform the infant Continental Army into a capable force, British Gen. Sir William Howe landed on Staten Island on June 25, 1776. On July 4, 1776, the Continental Congress in Philadelphia declared the independence of the American colonies. Washington's troops were subsequently defeated by Howe's forces in the battles of New York (August 27-30, 1776) and Brooklyn Heights (October 1776), but the bulk of Washington's forces escaped and retreated across New Jersey into Pennsylvania. Undaunted, Washington successfully launched the ragged remnants of his army against the Hessian mercenaries at Trenton on Christmas Eve 1776, and then defeated the British at Princeton in January 1777. Washington was less successful later in the year, meeting defeat at the hands of Gen. Howe at Brandywine (September 11, 1777). Howe then occupied Philadelphia and withstood an attack by Washington at Germantown (October 4, 1777). Meanwhile, British forces under Gen. Sir John Burgoyne invaded the rebellious colonies from Canada by way of Lake Champlain but was soundly defeated by the Americans under Gen. Horatio Gates at Saratoga (September 17 and October 5, 1777). The defeat of Burgoyne's invasion force and the inability of Howe to win a truly decisive victory over Washington led to diplomatic recognition of the United States by France on December 17, 1777, and a subsequent flow of aid from the French, including ground and naval forces. Even so, Washington's army barely survived a terrible winter encampment at Valley Forge in the winter of 1777-1778. Fortunately, the focus of the war shifted to the south in 1778, where the British began a campaign to “pacify” the southern colonies using loyalist troops. The campaign began well, and the British took Savannah (December 19, 1778) and Augusta (January 29, 1779) and successfully defeated American attempts to retake the lost cities. Using Georgia as a base, the British commander, Gen. Sir Henry Clinton, carried the war into South Carolina in 1780, taking Charleston on May 12, thereby obliterating the presence of the Continental Army in the south. Thereafter, the war in the south consisted largely of a guerrilla campaign by American leaders such as Francis Marion against the superior British forces, now commanded by Gen. Lord Charles Cornwallis, and their loyalist allies led by the notorious British Lt. Col. Banastre Tarleton. On August 16, 1780, Cornwallis' troops routed the American forces under Horatio Gates at Camden, but Gen. Nathanael Greene assumed command of the American forces at Charlotte, North Carolina, on December 2 and immediately took the offensive. On January 17, 1781, a small force of Continentals and militiamen under Greene and Brig. Gen. Daniel Morgan defeated the British at Cowpens but were defeated in turn by the British at Guilford Court House on March 15. Cornwallis then marched his forces into Virginia hoping to defeat the Continental Army forces there commanded by the Marquis de Lafayette. Instead, Lafayette, reinforced by the main Continental Army under Gen. Washington, succeeded in trapping Cornwallis' army at Yorktown on the Virginia peninsula. There, aided by a French fleet under Admiral De Grasse which cut Cornwallis off from support by the Royal Navy, the Americans besieged the British on September 28. On October 20, 1781, Cornwallis surrendered to Washington as the band played “The World Turned Upside Down.” Tired of the American war and preoccupied with threats to her interests on the Continent, Britain suspended offensive actions in America, and peace negotiations were opened. The Revolutionary War was subsequently ended formally by the Treaty of Paris (September 3, 1783).
See the Introduction, Abbreviations and Pronunciation for further details.
