American Pageant Chapter 8

Second Continental Congress

• met in Philly in 1775

• all 13 colonies were present

• did not want independence; still hoped that the King and Parliament would consent to a redress of grievances

George Washington

• selected by Congress to head the army

• good leader, bad military mind

Battle of Bunker Hill

• colonists seized Bunker Hill in June 1775

• British launched a frontal attack instead of flanking, allowing the colonists to shoot them down

Olive Branch Petition

• adopted in July 1775

• professed American loyalty

• begged the king to prevent further hostilities

What did King George III say about the Petition?

• cut out hope of reconciliation

• formally claimed that the colonies in rebellion in August 1775

• sealed arrangements for hiring thousands of Germans to fight (Hessians)

Why did the Americans want to conquer Canada?

• believed the French were impatient

• believed that Canada wanted to be liberated

  • would have added a 14th colony and would have deprived Britain of a valuable base

What happened to the conquest of Canada?

• failed miserably

  • Canadians did not want saving because of the Quebec Act

Common Sense overview

• written at a time where many considered themselves British

• written in 177 by Thomas Paine

• convinced the colonists that their true cause was independence

• 120,000 copies were sold in a few months

Common Sense ideologies

• called for the creation of a new political society

• argued that all gov officials should get their authority from the people

• most Americans considered citizen virtue fundamental to any republican government

Common Sense discourse

• not all Patriots agreed with Paine

• some favored a republic ruled by a natural aristocracy

• conservative republicans feared that the passionate feeling for liberty would overthrow the stability of the social order

Richard Henry

• June 7: said that the colonies should become independent

Why did the colonists have to write the Declaration of Independence?

• needed to enlist other British colonies in the Americas, to invite assistance from nations, and to rally resistance at home

What did TJ argue?

• argued that the king had disregarded these rights, so the colonists were justified in cutting their connection

• yapped about the tyrannous misdeeds of George III

Loyalists

• colonists loyal to the king

  • called Tories after the dominant political factions in Britain

Who won most of the support of the civilian population?

• colonists

  • convinced many that the British army was an unreliable friend and that they had a better chance with the patriots

What were most loyalists?

• old, educated, wealthy people

• most numerous where the Anglican Church was the strongest, other than Virginia

How were loyalists treated?

• subjected to tarring and feathering

• rebels regarded everyone else as traitors

• hundreds of loyalists were imprisoned, and some were hanged

• about 80k loyal supporters of George II were driven out

• estates of many loyalists were confiscated and sold

What was Britain’s base of operations?

• New York

• Boston was evacuated in 1776

Battle of Long Island

• summer and fall of 1776

• colonists were getting destroyed

• GWash escaped to Manhattan

• retreated northward to cross the Hudson to New Jersey

General William Howe

• British Commander-in-Chief

• not a military genius

What did the London officials want to capture in 1777 and why?

• the Hudson River Valley

• wanted to cut off New England from the rest of the states

What was their strategy?

• main force was under John Burgoyne, and he was supposed to push down the Lake Champlain route from Canada

• Howe’s troops could advance up the Hudson to meet Burgoyne near Albany

• Barry St. Leger was supposed to come in from the west through Lake Ontario and the Mohawk Valley

What went wrong?

• they forgot about Benedict Arnold

  • he retreated slowly along the St. Lawrence River back to the Lake Champlain area

• this depleted British supplies and delayed them

• the British were forced to leave for Canada

What ELSE went wrong?

• Burgoyne was burdened by a lot of women and supplies

• Howe didn’t follow the plan

  • went for an attack on Philly to meet GWash instead of following through with the plan

• GWash saw the British in NY so he went to Philly

• Howe settled down in the capital, leaving Burgoyne to struggle the wilds of upper NY

Battle of Saratoga

• Burgoyne had begun to get stuck near Albany, where militiamen trapped them

• Burgoyne was forced to surrender his entire command at Saratoga in 177 thanks to Horatio Gates

• one of the most important battles in world history, since it revived the colonial cause and allowed France to help

Why did France want to help the Americans?

• wanted to get revenge on Britain

  • if Britain lost its colonies, then it would cease to be a big power, allowing France to regain its prestige and position

American ideas about international affairs

• wanted to end colonialism and mercantilism

• strongly supported free trade and freedom of the seas

Model Treaty

• drafted by Congress in the summer of 1776 to guide the American commissioners

• no poli connection, no military connection, only a commercial connection

American last chance to salvage reconciliation

• Parliament passed a measure that offered the Americans home rule within their empire after Saratoga

  • did NOT include independence, so colonists disagreed

How did BF get French help?

• played on the fears of Anglo-American reconciliation

• France offered the treaty in 1778

What advantage did Spain give the French and Americans when they joined the war in 1779?

• Spanish and French fleets outnumbered Britain’s, so the British Isles were at the mercy of opposing warships

Armed Neutrality

• 1780

• organized by Catherine the Great of Russia

• lined up basically all of the European neutrals in an attitude of passive hostility toward Britain

How did the Europeans coming into war help America?

• Americans didn’t achieve their independence until the conflict erupted into a multipower world war that was too big for Britain to handle

• the war in the New World was secondary

How did British strategy change?

• they used to count on blockading the colonial coast and commanding the seas

• now the French and powerful fleets in American waters, jeopardizing Britain’s blockade and lines of supply

Why did BA switch sides?

• ambitious, greedy, and suffering from a feeling that his services were not appreciated

• sold out West Point, which commanded the Hudson

What was Britain’s plan to roll up the colonies?

• they wanted to start in the South

• started with Georgia, which was overrun in 1778-1779

• Charleston fell in 1780

General Nathanael Greene

• quaker tactician

• distinguished himself by his strategy of delay in the Carolina campaign in 1781

• stood, then retreated, exhausting Cornwallis

• by losing battles but winning campaigns, he succeeded in clearing most of Georgia and SC of British troops

How were the Iroquois split up?

• Oneidas and Tuscaroras sided with the Americans

• Senecas, Mohawks, Cayugas, and Onondagas joined the British

  • forced to sign the Treaty of Fort Stanwix the first treaty between the United States and an Indian Nation

American navy

• consisted of only a handful ships, but they were commanded by daring officers, like JPJ

• never made a DENT, genuinely the British were TICKLED, in Britain’s thunderous fleets

Cornwallis’ blunder

• fallen back to the Chesapeake at Yorktown to get supplies and reinforcements

  • assumed that Britain would continue to control the sea, but these few weeks were one of the brief periods during the war when British naval superiority slipped away

French support at Yorktown

• Admiral de Grasse told the Americans that he was free to join them in an assault on Cornwallis at Yorktown

The Battle of Yorktown

• GWash made a swift march to the Chesapeake from NY

• GWash threatened the British by land with Rochambeau, while de Grasse stopped them by sea

• Cornwallis surrendered his entire force of 7k men on Oct 19, 1781

British reactions to Yorktown

• PM Lord North said that the war was over

  • George III wanted to continue, since Britain had 54k troops in NA, including 32k in the US

• Fighting continued for more than a year after Yorktown, with Patriot-Loyalist warfare in the South especially savage

What happened with the British after the war?

• many Britons knew the war was over and were ready to come to terms

  • they had suffered heavy losses in India and in the West Indies

• Lord North’s ministry collapsed in March 1782, ending the personal rule of George III

  • a Whig ministry replaced him

Which colonists went to Paris and what were they instructed to do?

• BF, JA, and JJ

• had instructions from Congress to make no separate peace and to consult with their French allies at all stages of the negotiation

What did France want out of the new country?

• they wanted an independent US in abstract, not in action

• they schemed to keep the country cooped up east of the Allegheny Mountains to promote French interests and policy

How did JJ save America?

• perceived that the French could not satisfy the conflicting ambitions of the Americans and Spaniards

  • thought he saw signs indicating that the Paris Foreign Office was about to betray America’s trans-Appalachian interests

  • he secretly made separate trips to London

Treaty of Paris (1783)

• the British recognized the independence of the US

• granted boundaries stretching to the Mississippi on the west, to the Great Lakes on the north, and to Spanish Florida on the south

• Americans retained a share of Newfoundland

• Loyalists were not to be persecuted, and Congress was to recommend to the state legislatures that the confiscated Loyalist property be restored

• states vowed to put no lawful obstacles in the way of their collection to repay the debt

What was the Whig ministry more friendly to the Americans than the Tories?

They were determined to solve recent wounds, reopen trade channels, and prevent future wars over the trans-Appalachian region