 230,000 plus served in the continental army  145,000 served in local militias  Few had military experience

Referred to soldiers of the British Army because of the red uniforms formerly worn by the majority of regiments Men who fought for the United States in the Revolutionary War served in units controlled by their state (part-time militia or regular state troops) or in the Continental Army

Guerrilla tactics were first used at the Battles of Lexington and Concord George Washington sometimes used some sort of unconventional methods to fight the British Was one of the factors that helped the Americans gain independence

 December 1777  Shortages of food and clothing  1/5 died of disease and malnutrition  Friedrich von Steuben arrived; trained the army W3mPVtE

 Christmas night 1776  Washington crossed the Delaware River with 2,400 troops  Captured 1,400 Hessians in less than an hour  Five casualties

 January 2nd  Left fires burning  Next morning attacked Cornwallis  Continental Army drove them back  Battle led to increased support and moral

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 General John Burgoyne (British)  General Horatio Gates (Colonist)  Led 8,000 British soldiers to cut off New England colonies  Plan was for three British armies to converge at Albany, New York  October 17, 1777 Burgoyne surrounded and outnumbered surrendered near Saratoga

 February 6, 1778 United States and France signed treaty of alliance  Supplies, loans, troops, and navy  Spain joined France a year later

 George Rogers Clark  1778  175 soldiers  Persuaded some Native Americans to remain neutral  Battle of Vincennes 1779

 Used fewer than 100 ships  Started the war with 8 ships  Attacked single ships, supply ports, and merchant ships  British navy lost nearly 200 ships  John Paul Jones: asked to surrender, responded with, “I have not yet begun to fight”

 British defeated patriots at Charleston, South Carolina May 12, 1780  British capture 5,000  August 1780, patriot forces lost at Camden, South Carolina  British captured 3,300 out of 4,000  Lost Southern Army  Francis Marion (swamp fox) used guerrilla warfare

 1781  16,000 French and colonial forces moved to surround Cornwallis  French navy closed off Chesapeake Bay and kept the British navy from supporting Cornwallis  Cornwallis surrendered after several weeks  October 20, 1781 British troops left in defeat

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 Negotiated for the United States by Ben Franklin, John Adams, John Jay and Henry Laurens on February 3, 1783 after Cornwallis’s surrender at Yorktown.

 The most important thing the treaty did was to recognize the independence of the United States of America.  It also marked the boundaries of the new nation.  The United States now possessed everything from the Atlantic west to the Mississippi River.  The Northern border was set at the Great Lakes and along Quebec and Nova Scotia.

 The victory left America with a foreign debt.  $11,710,379 (Foreign)  $65 Million (domestic)