1776 - Political Events

Political Events

The Declaration of Independence signed July 4 at Philadelphia follows military and naval action in the American Revolution that began last year. Continental naval commodore Esek Hopkins joins the new fleet of eight small converted merchant vessels early in the year at Philadelphia (see 1775); ordered by the Continental Congress to sail into the Chesapeake Bay and attack a strong British fleet there, he chooses instead to bypass the Chesapeake and attack the British post at New Providence in the Bahamas, where he captures a store of valuable war matériel.

Thomas Paine's 46-page pamphlet "Common Sense" appears anonymously at Philadelphia January 10 and marshals arguments for the justice of the revolutionary cause: "The cause of America is, in great measure, the cause of all mankind . . . The laying a country desolate with fire and sword, declaring war against the natural rights of all mankind, and extirpating the defenders thereof from the face of the earth, is the concern of every man to whom nature hath given the power of feeling . . . Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil [and] in its worst state an intolerable one." "There is something exceedingly ridiculous in the composition of monarchy; it first excludes a man from the means of information, yet empowers him to act in cases where the highest judgment is required." Paine's pamphlet has sales of 100,000 copies almost overnight, newspapers throughout the colonies reprint parts of it, men read it aloud in taverns, officers read it to their men, it persuades thousands of people that separation from Britain is not only inevitable but urgently needed, and it wins its author a position as aide to Rhode Island-born General Nathaniel Greene, 34. Sales of the pamphlet by year's end total nearly half a million.

Thomas Paine
Thomas Paine's fiery pamphlets "Common Sense" and "The Crisis" roused American sentiments against the British. (Reprinted from John Clark Ridpath, Cyclopedia of Universal History. Vol. 3. Ohio: The Jones Brothers Publishing Company, 1890.)

The Battle of Moore's Creek Bridge February 27 ends in defeat for some 1,600 Scottish Highlanders and upper North Carolina Regulators, who have marched toward Wilmington, North Carolina, under the command of General Donald McDonald to join British troops arriving by sea from Boston and England. A rebel militia group of about 1,000 men has positioned itself at the bridge, 18 miles northwest of Wilmington, under the command of Colonels Alexander Lillington and Richard Caswell. Only one militiaman is killed and one wounded; the others take 900 prisoners and seize arms, supplies, and £15,000. The quick American victory discourages Newfoundland-born general Sir Henry Clinton, 38, from landing a British expeditionary force in the Southern colonies.

Lord North tells the House of Commons February 29 that it will be cheaper and more efficient to hire mercenaries than to recruit men at home for the army in America; he makes a motion that treaties between George III and the landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, the duke of Brunswick, and the hereditary prince of Hesse-Cassel be referred to the committee of supply. He receives support from Lord George Germaine, who notes that in every war or rebellion England has hired foreigners to fight her battles or support her government. Opponents say that hiring mercenaries even at £7 per man would cost too much and would disgrace Britain in the eyes of all Europe. The issue is debated also in the House of Lords, but the motion carries in the Lords by a vote of 100 to 32 and in the Commons by 242 to 88. Six small German despots will supply nearly 30,000 mercenaries, 17,000 coming from Hesse-Kassel; most are soldiers of fortune skilled in the use of bayonets at close quarters.

General Artemas Ward orders a subordinate general March 6 to seize Dorchester Heights, forcing the British to complete their evacuation of Boston March 17 after taking losses from artillery fire (see Ward, Knox, 1775). General William Howe sails for Nova Scotia with 900 Loyalists (many will settle in New Brunswick) while the rest of the British move to New York and points south.

Naval commodore Esek Hopkins returns from the Bahamas in April and wages an inconclusive battle with H.M.S. Glasgow on Long Island Sound. Despite a spirited defense by John Adams, Hopkins is formally censured later in the year for having disobeyed orders in going to the Bahamas and for being inactive since then while his fleet lay idle in Narragansett Bay (see 1777).

Lee's Resolutions urge the colonies to make foreign alliances and form a confederation under a constitution to be approved by each state. The Virginia Convention sitting at Williamsburg May 6 has voted unanimously to break its 169-year-old ties to Britain and instructed its delegate Richard Henry Lee, 44, May 15 to propose independence. Introduced into the Second Continental Congress at Philadelphia June 7, his three resolutions include an announcement "That these United Colonies are and of right ought to be free and independent states." A letter signed "Republicus" appears June 29 in the Pennsylvania Evening News making reference to The United States of America; Congress changes the name United Colonies to United States September 9.

Patriots/rebels seize Argyllshire-born British lieutenant colonel Archibald Campbell, 36, in Boston Harbor June 16. A veteran of last year's Battle of Quebec, Campbell will remain a prisoner until May 1778, when he will be exchanged for Ethan Allen.

The Continental Congress commissions Connecticut representative Silas Deane, 38, to sail to France for supplies and investigate the possibilities of French recognition of American independence with a view to treaties of alliance and commerce (see 1777). The Congress last November named Virginia-born physician-politician Arthur Lee, now 35, to act as its London agent and in October asks him to join Deane and Franklin at Paris with a view to negotiating alliances with France and other European nations that might supply the Continental Army with weaponry (the colonies have no gun factories of their own) (see 1778).

Patriots/rebels at Sullivan's Island off Charleston, South Carolina, repulse a British fleet under General Clinton and Sir Peter Parker, 55, June 28. Charleston-born planter and politician Colonel William Moultrie, 45, has built a 16-foot wall of sand and palmetto logs, manned it with a force of 400, and equipped it with 31 guns; Governor John Rutledge has given former British Army officer Charles Lee command of the colony's troops, and he has been arranging for the evacuation of the island, but it survives a heavy bombardment and is renamed Fort Moultrie.

Thomas Jefferson reads the Declaration of Independence to the Continental Congress June 28. He has been working on it since June 11 as part of a five-man committee that has included John Adams and Benjamin Franklin, borrowing words and arguments from documents that included George Mason's draft of Virginia's Declaration of Human Rights. The congress irritates Jefferson by making substantial changes in the declaration, which makes reference to the United States of America:

When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinion of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by the Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. —That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed . . . And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

Where Mason borrowed philosopher John Locke's 1690 call for protection of "life, liberty, and property," Jefferson has substituted "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

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Those who signed the Declaration of Independence were putting their property and their very lives at risk.

General Sir William Howe lands unopposed on Staten Island July 2, having arrived off Sandy Hook June 25.

The Continental Congress adopts Lee's Resolutions July 2.

Continental Congress president John Hancock signs the Declaration of Independence July 4, writing his name in large letters and saying, "There, I guess King George will be able to read that." The Declaration is set in type and printed in a shop at 48 High Street; the 56 signers are all members of Congress but most of them do not affix their names to the document until August 2 (some will not sign until November). The signatories are keenly aware that they have only the slimmest chance of success and that in all likelihood they will go to the gallows. Signer Benjamin Franklin says, "We must all hang together, else we shall all hang separately." Abigail Adams (née Smith), 31, at Boston has several months earlier written to her husband, John, at Philadelphia, "This intelligence will make a plain truth for you, though a dangerous one. I could not join today in the petitions of our worthy pastor for a reconciliation between our no longer parent state, but tyrant state, and these Colonies. Let us separate: they are unworthy to be our brethren."

News reaches New York July 9 that a Declaration of Independence has been signed at Philadelphia. General Washington has the declaration read to his troops, who return to their barracks and campgrounds, whereupon a crowd rampages through town, breaking the windows of prominent Loyalists. The Sons of Liberty and other civilians pull down and destroy the 4,000-pound equestrian statue of Britain's George III in Bowling Green; its head is sawed off and its lead taken away by some accounts to be melted down and molded into 42,000 musket balls by the wife and daughter of the governor of Connecticut; the 5-year-old iron fence surrounding the statue and the green is partly destroyed as the mob tears off its ornaments, but much, if not most, of the city remains staunchly loyal to the Crown and regards the bid for independence as ill-advised, ill-conceived, and certain to fail.

A Royal Navy fleet under the command of the swarthy Viscount Richard "Black Dick" Howe, 50, arrives off Staten Island July 12 with 280 ships, 33,000 soldiers, and 10,000 sailors to join the admiral's younger brother, General William Howe, with the largest amphibious force ever assembled; Vice Admiral Howe has been given command of the North American station, he had hoped to conciliate the colonists, but he makes a show of force July 12 by sending H.M.S. Phoenix and H.M.S. Rose up the Hudson with guns blazing; former colonial governor William Tryon has been obliged to remain aboard ship since returning from England more than a year ago but is finally able to debark.

General Henry Clinton arrives on Staten Island August 1.

The Continental Congress appoints Lieut. Col. Rufus Putnam, 38, engineer with the rank of full colonel August 5; a Massachusetts-born cousin of General Israel Putnam, Putnam has built defensive works around Boston and in the New York area, but he insists on having a distinct and properly organized engineering corps (see Gridley, 1775), and when Congress takes no definite action he resigns his commission, accepts command of a Massachusetts regiment, and will earn the rank of brigadier general (see Corps of Engineers, 1779).

General Howe determines to end the rebellion with a single massive victory and leaves Staten Island beginning August 22, crosses the Narrows in 75 flatboats with planked up sides, and comes ashore at Gravesend Bay and Denyse Ferry (later Fort Hamilton) with cannon, horses, munitions, and supplies. Augmenting the British regulars are 7,800 Hessians under the command of Lt. Gen. Leopold Philip von Heister, a veteran of the Seven Years' War whose men are battle-hardened whereas no more than 6,000 of the colonials have had any military experience. The Battle of Brooklyn that is part of the larger Battle of Long Island (still called Nassau Island) pits George Washington's 7,500 Continental Army troops and colonial militiamen against an enemy that outnumbers him more than two to one. The Americans are well dug in at Brooklyn Heights and in forward positions, but they have not defended Jamaica Pass except for five mounted militia officers whose instructions are to send warning if the pass is threatened. Colonial musketfire takes a heavy toll on General Howe's troops as they try to advance uphill. He realizes that he must adopt different tactics, so he positions about half his men near the three southern passes to make it appear that he will launch his attack there, but he then gathers 10,000 troops at Flatlands, marches them under an almost full moon north to Jamaica Pass, and captures the five militia officers there at about 2 o'clock in the morning without a shot being fired. Having delayed action in hopes that General Washington would surrender, Howe fires off two shots at 9 o'clock in the morning of August 27 at Bedford, signalling some 4,000 British soldiers to attack; General Israel Putnam's colonials contain them briefly, but about 8,000 additional redcoats arrive an hour later, gain support from local Loyalists who know the terrain, and come up from behind to surround the 1,200 Americans, most of whom surrender (although many are massacred in the Gowanus marshes). A band of 400 Marylanders launches an assault on the 10,000 surrounding British and German forces; forced back, 250 survivors put up stout resistance at the old stone Vechte-Cortelyou house and give the routed colonial forces time to retreat across a bridge over Gowanus Creek before seeking refuge in the forts on Brooklyn Heights; having lost 1,407 men killed, wounded, or missing (the British have sustained relatively few casualties), General Washington sets up headquarters at the Cornell house on Brooklyn Heights and brings over reinforcements from New York, but his aides persuade him that Manhattan offers better opportunities for defensive action, so with help from local boatmen he moves his remaining 9,300 men across the East River from Fulton Landing under cover of fog and rain on the night of August 29. Admiral Howe has somehow failed to block the East River crossing, and his brother on Brooklyn Heights finds that the rebels have slipped away, the last man on the last boat to cross being George Washington.

General Washington realizes that he cannot hold New York City; General Greene urges that nothing be left behind that the enemy can use, two-thirds of New York property belongs to Loyalists, and Washington writes to the Continental Congress at Philadelphia September 2 asking whether he should have his departing troops torch the city or let the British have it for use as winter quarters. "They would derive great convenience from it on the one hand; and much property would be destroyed on the other." Congress still hopes that New York can be recaptured and opposes any scorched-earth policy.

The submarine Turtle goes into action against Royal Navy vessels in New York Harbor the night of September 6, pioneering the use of the submarine in warfare. Built by Yale graduate David Bushnell, 34, the pear-shaped, seven-foot vessel is made of oak staves held together with pitch and iron hoops. It has ballast tanks operated by foot pumps, its conning tower has windows level with the head of the operator (Sgt. Ezra Lee), who uses two air tubes for intake and exhaustion of air (automatic valves close them for diving), is propelled horizontally and vertically by hand-cranked propellers and guided by a flexible rudder, carries a powder magazine with a clock timer, and has an auger mounted on its top to bore a hole into the wooden hull of an enemy vessel so that it may plant its powder magazine, but many of the British vessels have copperclad bottoms that add to their speed and protect them against shipworms, Sgt. Lee's effort to plant a charge in the bottom of H.M.S. Eagle fails, several other attempts to plant charges prove fruitless, and the British shift their entire fleet (see transportation [Lake], 1897).

General Washington sends the Continental Congress a letter urging that a regular army be enlisted to serve for the duration of the war (many regiments have voted to disband and return home in the wake of the defeat in Brooklyn). He warns that he may not be able to obey his orders to defend Manhattan, which the British clearly intend to use as their winter quarters, and he devises a new strategy of evasive actions that will exhaust the British without directly engaging them. Congress resolves September 10 to reform the Continental Army into 88 battalions to be "enlisted as soon as possible, and to serve during the war," but its members are so fearful that a standing army may bring "military despotism" that they retain the old method of levying troops by requisitions upon the several states and the appointment of officers without proper regard to their qualifications.

General Howe and his secretary Sir Henry Starchey meet September 11 at the 86-year-old Christopher Billopp house in Staten Island's Tottenville section with John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and Edward Rutledge in an effort to end the war by negotiation. Howe has captured two major generals, including New Hampshire-born soldier John Sullivan, 36, and learns for the first time that the Declaration of Independence has been signed. He offers "clemency and full pardon to all repentant rebels" if they will lay down their arms. Sullivan gains General Washington's grudging consent to carry General Howe's peace overtures to the Continental Congress at Philadelphia (where he is freed in exchange for a British general), but Franklin, Adams, and Rutledge demur, Congress refuses to retract the declaration, and negotiations break off. Washington positions 9,500 men on the heights of Harlem and at Kings Bridge, deploys 5,000 along the shore of the East River above New York, and leaves only 5,000 in Manhattan.

General Howe arrives at Kips Bay on Manhattan September 15 with five frigates, his cannonfire disperses defenders ashore, his infantry clambers up the steep rocks at what later will be the foot of East 34th Street, and—by some accounts—he stops for lunch at the Murray Hill home of Mary Murray (née Lindley), 50, whose husband, Robert, has built a house he calls Inclenberg on property acquired by his late father, James, in 1723, entertains the general and his officers with help from her beautiful daughters. General Howe is carrying on an affair with the wife of a subordinate and narrowly misses catching General Washington, who has galloped down from the Jumel Mansion to hold off the British until General Putnam can withdraw troops trapped at the Battery; a woman near the Battery starts a fire that consumes much of the city, not only diverting attention of the British from Putnam's troops but creating smoke that masks Washington's retreat to Harlem Heights, where he repulses a British attack September 16 with help from his sharpshooters. Armed with Pennsylvania long rifles (see 1710), infantrymen of the Continental Army can fire accurately at 200 to 400 yards, while musket balls carry effectively only 80 to 100 yards (the British will complain that American sharpshooters are unsportsmanlike in concentrating their fire on officers), but although the rifles cannot be fitted with bayonets, and they take a full minute to reload, and riflemen are vulnerable to being shot in the process, the conventional style of exchanging volleys of musket fire goes against the American grain (see Battle of Saratoga, 1777).

General Washington spends most of September on Harlem Heights with the main body of his army, observing the movements of General Howe.

Continental Army captain Nathan Hale, 21, undertakes an espionage mission to gather intelligence on Long Island but blunders into a trap September 21. Having set numerous fires to harry the British in New York, the Connecticut-born Yale graduate has left his uniform and papers with a fellow soldier at Norwalk, disguised himself as a Dutch schoolmaster to avoid arrest, taken a boat across Long Island Sound, but made the mistake of confiding in a stranger who has pretended to be a spy himself. The stranger is French and Indian War hero Robert Rogers, who invites Hale to dinner, British soldiers seize him, and he is taken to Manhattan, where he is hanged September 22 by order of General Howe. His last words will be reported as, "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country," actually a paraphrase of a line from a popular play by the late Joseph Addison.

Polish military tactician Tadeusz Andrzej Bonawentura Kosciuszko, 30, enters the Continental Army as a volunteer, having been wounded by the retainers of Sosnowski of Sownowicka, the Grand Hetman, with whose youngest daughter he tried to elope. Kosciuszko has studied fortification and naval tactics at Polish government expense in Prussia, France, and Italy, and will distinguish himself in the American cause. General Washington will make him his adjutant and raise him to the rank of colonel of artillery (see 1794).

Benedict Arnold assembles a makeshift fleet of schooners and open boats on Lake Champlain to block the advance of General Sir Guy Carleton, now 52, who has moved south with 12,000 men. Some of Colonel Arnold's vessels have been dismantled on the St. Lawrence River, hauled overland, and then reassembled; he confronts Sir Guy October 11 in the Battle of the Island of Valcour, the hard-fought encounter costs both sides dearly, Arnold sails through the British fleet at night without Sir Guy knowing what has happened, the British pursue him, Sir Guy defeats him soundly October 13, but Arnold runs his own schooner ashore and burns it along with some of his open boats to keep them from falling into enemy hands. He has delayed the southward advance of Sir Guy, who takes Crown Point but soon withdraws to Canada.

General Howe loads a large part of his army into 90 flat boats October 12 and lands them on Throg's Neck. General Washington sends a force to oppose the landing and occupy lower Westchester, but Howe takes the heights of New Rochelle and is joined by a newly-arrived contingent of Hessian troops under the command of General Wilhelm von Knyphausen. The Battle of White Plains October 28 to 31 gives General Howe a narrow victory over General Washington. Each side has fielded about 13,000 men, Howe has brought up reinforcements, and Washington withdraws under cover of darkness behind entrenchments in the hills of North Castle as Howe falls back to an encampment on the heights of Fordham.

General Washington decides after an open war council to move with 5,000 men across the Hudson into New Jersey and establishes headquarters November 14 at Fort Lee (formerly Fort Constitution) on the Palisades; he has left Colonel Robert Magaw with nearly 3,000 Pennsylvania volunteers to defend Fort Washington on the Harlem Heights, but although the Continental Congress has sent word that the fort must be held at all costs Magaw finds himself heavily outnumbered, takes losses, and has little choice but to surrender November 16. The British and Hessians lose 458 men out of their 8,000-man force but capture 2,828 rebels and put 53 of them to death while General Washington looks on in despair from across the river at Fort Lee. General Charles Cornwallis, 38, leads more than 4,000 British troops across the Hudson November 20 about six miles north of Fort Lee, hoping to trap the Continental Army between the Hackensack and Hudson rivers; he advances with 8,000 men toward General Nathaniel Greene, who hurriedly evacuates Fort Lee, letting it fall into enemy hands with 50 British-made cannon, large stores of ammunition and flour, tents, blankets, and huge quantities of other provisions. The British gain control of the Hudson, Greene and his men join Washington across the Hackensack River, and they begin a retreat across New Jersey the next day. Washington has lost 90 percent of his army and is left with no more than about 3,000 men; he sends pleas for help to General Charles Lee, who is in Pennsylvania with 4,000 men but has opted to employ guerrilla tactics. Lee eventually follows orders, marches his men to New Jersey December 12, takes quarters at White's Tavern in Basking Ridge, but denounces Washington in a letter to General Horatio Gates as "a certain great man" who is "most damnably deficient. He has thrown me into a situation where I have my choice of difficulties." The British soon capture Lee and take him to New York; where he will remain imprisoned for 18 months (see Battle of Monmouth, 1778).

General Washington escapes across the Delaware River into Pennsylvania, having burnt bridges across the Hackensack and Passaic rivers in his retreat to Newark and then to New Brunswick, Princeton, and Trenton with General Cornwallis in hot pursuit, but he has left the British in possession of New Jersey. Washington's men have no tents or blankets, little food, and no salt; one fifth of them are suffering from dysentery. While the British and Hessians can use flogging, officers in the egalitarian American army must rely on cajolery and exhortation to maintain discipline; more than 2,000 militiamen from Maryland and New Jersey reach the end of their enlistment periods November 30 and return home. In desperation and hoping for a miracle, Washington requisitions some heavy open boats used to bring pig iron into Philadelphia, crosses the half-frozen Delaware from the Pennsylvania shore Christmas night with 2,400 ill-equipped men in boats that go back to fetch 18 field guns plus horses to pull them, surprises a well-trained and well-armed contingent of 1,500 Hessians at dawn December 26, forces their commander Colonel Johann G. Rall to surrender, and turns the tide of the war, killing about 100 (Rall is shot from his horse and dies 2 days later) and taking more than 900 prisoners (the other Hessians have fled into the woods) without sustaining a single casualty in what will be remembered as the Battle of Trenton. Colonel Henry Knox has made his voice heard over the gale-force winds to relay Washington's orders, organized the deployment of Continental Army troops, and is elected brigadier general of artillery after the first triumph against the British and their mercenaries.

News of the victory at Trenton soon reaches every colony, giving heart to the Americans and enabling Washington to persuade men who have enlisted in his little army to remain for at least one more month; the Continental Congress grants Washington greater powers December 27, and 3 days later he leads 1,600 volunteers, Continental Army regulars, and New Jersey and Pennsylvania militiamen back into Trenton, where he meets with others that swell his ranks to nearly 6,000 men; General Cornwallis has 5,500, but the Americans slip away northward toward Princeton (see 1777).

Catherine the Great's court favorite Grigori Aleksandrovich Potemkin, now 37, builds a Russian Black Sea fleet. Potemkin distinguished himself in 1769 fighting the Turks.

The Treaty of Purandhur signed March 1 annuls last year's Treaty of Surat. Raghunath Rao, peshwa (chief minister) of the Maratha, is given a pension, but the British East India Company retains the revenues of Salsette and Broach, and hostilities in the first Anglo-Maratha War continue (see 1778).

The East India Company's governor of Madras George Pigot, 1st Baronet Pigot (of Patshul), suspends two members of his council and orders the arrest of the city's commandant Sir Robert Fletcher (see 1761). Pigot returned to Madras last year and has made enemies by attempting to suppress the corruption that has become widespread in the public service. His proposal that the raja (ruler) of Tanjore be restored has brought opposition from a majority of the council, who have the backing of trader Paul Benfield, and they take over the government, imprisoning Pigot (see 1777).