-
Battles of Lexington and Concord
The spring of 1775 was a cold one in New England.scarce. General Gage had been forced to put his army on strict rations, and British morale was low.The agents also told that John Hancock and Samuel Adams, perhaps the two most prominent leaders of resistance to British authority, were staying in Lexington, a smaller community about five miles east of Concord.“A GLORIOUS DAY FOR
AMERICA” By the morning of April 19, 1775, the king’s troops reached Lexington. -
Battle at Bunker Hill
June 17, 1775, Gage sent out nearly 2,400 British troops. The British, sweating in wool uniforms and heavy packs, began marching up Breed’s Hill in their customary broad lines.lines. The
colonists held their fire until the last minute, then began to shoot down the advancing redcoats. The British troops made a second attack, and then a third. The third assault succeeded, but only because the militiamen ran low on
ammunition. -
Battle of New York
Two brothers, General William Howe and Admiral Richard Howe, joined forces on Staten Island and sailed into New York harbor in the summer of 1776 with the largest British expeditionary force ever. The British had pushed Washington’s army across the Delaware River into Pennsylvania. Washington’s men had either deserted or had been killed or captured. Fewer than 8,000 men remained under Washington's command, and the terms of their enlistment were due to end on December 31. -
Battle of Trenton
Christmas night of, 1776. marched in fierce storm, he led 2,400
men in small rowboats across the ice-choked Delaware River.
By the next morning, the men had marched nine miles through sleet
and snow to the objective—Trenton, New Jersey, held by a garrison of Hessian. Marched in the storm, most of the Hessian had drunk too much rum the night before and were still sleeping it off. In a surprise attack, the Americans killed 30 of the enemy and took 918 captives and six Hessian cannons. -
Battle at Saratoga
Howe’s fellow British generals, General John “Gentleman Johnny” Burgoyne, convinced the London high command to allow him to pursue a complex scheme. The Continental Congress had appointed General Horatio Gates to command the Northern Department of the Continental Army. The surrender at Saratoga dramatically changed Britain’s war strategy. From that time on, the British generally kept their troops along the coast, close to the big guns and supply bases of the British fleet. -
Fight for Philadelphia
In spring of 1777, General Howe began his campaign to seize the American capital at Philadelphia.The Continental Congress fled the city while Washington’s troops unsuccessfully tried to block the redcoats at nearby Brandywine Creek. -
Winter at Valley Forge
British controlled New York and parts of New England. Washington led his 12,000-man army into winter quarters at Valley Forge, located approximately 18 miles struggled to stay alive suffered from exposure & frostbite, and surgeons like Albigensian Waldo worked constantly but often unsuccessfully to save arms and limbs from amputation. Washington’s letters to the Congress and his friends were filled with reports of the suffering and endurance of his men. -
British Surrender at Yorktown
Lafayette’s plan, the Americans and the French closed in on Cornwallis.about 17,000 French and American troops surrounded the British on the Yorktown peninsula and bombarded them day and night.On October 19, a triumphant Washington, the French
generals, and their troops assembled to accept the British surrender. -
British Losses in 1791
rebel slaves killed 2,000 whites. 1793-98: 13,000 out of 20,000 British troops died, mostly of disease. 1802-1803: French lost 40,000 soldiers. -
British take South
In 1780, General Henry Clinton, who had
replaced Howe in New York, along with the ambitious general Charles Cornwallis sailed south with 8,500 men. In May 1780 and marched 5,500 American soldiers off as prisoners of war. Clinton then left for New York, leaving Cornwallis to command the British forces in the South and to conquer South and North Carolina.