When he took command of the army at Cambridge on July 3, 1775, the majority of Congress was reluctant to adopt measures that denoted independence, although favoring an energetic conduct of the war. The government of Lord North decided to send an overpowering army to America, and to that end tried to recruit 20,000 mercenaries in Russia. On August 23, George III issued the Royal Proclamation of Rebellion, which branded Washington as guilty of treason and threatend him with "condign punishment." Early in October, Washington concluded that in order to win the war the colonies must become independent.
In August 1775, Washington insisted to Gen. Thomas Gage, the British commander at Boston, that American officers captured by the British should be treated as prisoners of war--not as criminals (that is, rebels). In this, Washington asserted that the conflict was a war between two separate powers and that the Union was on a par with Britain. He defended the rank of American officers as being drawn from "the uncorrupted choice of a brave and free people, the purest source and original fountain of all power." In August-September he initiated an expedition for the conquest of Canada and invited the king's subjects there to join the 13 colonies in an "indissoluble union." About the same time he created a navy of six vessels, which he sent out to capture British ships bringing supplies to Boston. Congress had not favored authorizing a navy, then deemed to be an arm of an independent state. Early in November, Washington inaugurated a campaign for arresting, disarming, and detaining the Tories. Because their leaders were agents of the British crown, his policy struck at the highest symbol of Britain's authority. He urged the opening of American ports to French ships and used his prestige and the strength of the army to encourage leaders of the provincial governments to adopt measures that committed their colonies to independence. His influence was evident in the campaigns for independence in Connecticut, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and New York. He contributed as much to the decision for independence as any man. The Declaration of Independence was formally adopted on July 4, 1776.
The Military Campaigns
Washington's military record during the revolution is highly creditable. His first success came on March 17, 1776, when the British evacuated Boston. He had kept them surrounded and immobilized during a siege of more than eight months. He had organized a first American army and had recruited and trained a second. His little fleet had distressed the British by intercepting their supplies. Lack of powder and cannon long kept him from attacking. Once they had been procured, he occupied, on March 4-5, 1776, a strong position on Dorchester Heights, Mass., where he could threaten to bombard the British camp. The evacuation made him a hero by proving that the Americans could overcome the British in a major contest. For five months thereafter the American cause was brightened by the glow of this outstanding victory--a perilous time when confidence was needed to sustain morale.
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Washington's next major achievement was made in the second half of 1776, when he avoided a serious defeat and held the army together in the face of overwhelming odds. In July and August the British invaded southern New York with 34,000 well-equipped troops. In April, Washington's force had consisted of only 7,500 effective men. Early in June, Congress had called 19,800 militia for service in Canada and New York. In a few weeks Washington had to weld a motley throng into a unified force. Even then his men were outnumbered three to two by the British. Although he suffered a series of minor defeats (Brooklyn Heights, August 26-29; Kip's Bay, September 15; Harlem Heights, September 16; White Plains, October 28; Fort Washington, November 16), the wonder is that he escaped a catastrophe.
After the setbacks in New York, he retreated through New Jersey, crossing the Delaware River in December. The American cause now sank to its lowest ebb. Washington's main army, reduced to 3,000 men, seemed about to disintegrate. It appeared that the British could march easily to Philadelphia. Congress moved to Baltimore. In these dire straits Washington made a dramatic move that ended an agonizing campaign in a blaze of glory. On the stormy night of December 25-26 he recrossed the Delaware, surprised Britain's Hessian mercenaries at Trenton, and captured 1,000 prisoners. This move gave him a striking position in central New Jersey, whereupon the British ceased offensive operations and pulled back to the vicinity of New York.
On Oct. 17, 1777, Gen. John Burgoyne surrendered at Saratoga, N. Y., his army of 5,000 men--all that were left of the 9,500 who had invaded New York from Canada. To this great victory Washington made two contributions. First, in September 1775, he sent an expedition to conquer Canada. Although that aim was not attained, the project put the Americans in control of the approaches to northern New York, particularly Lake Champlain. Burgoyne encountered so many obstacles there that his advance was seriously delayed. That in turn gave time for the militia of New England to turn out in force and to contribute decisively to his defeat. Second, in 1777, Washington conducted a campaign near Philadelphia that prevented Gen. William Howe from using his large army for the relief of Burgoyne. Washington's success at Trenton had placed him where he could both defend Philadelphia and strike at British-held New York. Howe had thereupon undertaken a campaign with the hope of occupying Philadelphia and of crushing Washington's army. Although Washington suffered minor defeats--at Brandywine Creek on September 11 and at Germantown on October 4--he again saved his army and, by engaging Howe in Pennsylvania, made possible the isolation and eventual defeat of Burgoyne.
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Unable to overcome Washington in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, the British shifted their main war effort to the South. In 1781 their invasion of Virginia enabled Washington to strike a blow that virtually ended the war. France had joined the United States as a full-fledged ally in February 1778, thereby putting French troops at Washington's disposal and, more important, giving him the support of a strong navy which he deemed essential to victory. His plan of 1781 called for an advance from New York to Virginia of a large American-French army which would act in concert with the French fleet, to which was assigned the task of controlling Chesapeake Bay, thereby preventing an escape by sea of the British forces under Lord Cornwallis. Washington's army trapped Cornwallis at Yorktown, Va., on the York River, and the French admiral, count de Grasse, gained command of the bay. Outnumbered, surrounded on land, and cut off by sea, Cornwallis surrendered his 7,000 troops on October 19. Although Britain still had large forces in America, the Yorktown blow, along with war weariness induced by six years of failure, moved the war party in England to resign in March 1782 in favor of a ministry willing to make peace on the basis of the independence of the United States.