September 15th, 1776. A company of Connecticut farm boys sit behind one of the many redoubts dug into the upper slope of Harlem Heights. Behind them stretches the northern plateau of Manhattan Island extending to King’s Bridge and spanning the Bronx River and leading to Westchester County. One week earlier the boys had been busy …
At the start of 1776, General George Washington agreed with most New Yorkers that their city was defenseless. Yet the problem was deeper. In reality, no matter what efforts were taken to strengthen its response to invasion, the city could never be defended. Though every general politician knew it; they were also aware they had no …
The Pennsylvania Hospital in Philadelphia compiled the most extensive report about diseases and success rates of doctors during the Revolutionary War Period. Aside from mental disorders which affected nearly one fifth of all patients, half of the hospital’s cases concerned seven disorders: scurvy – 15%, fevers – 9%, venereal disease – 9%, dropsy – 6%, …
Come all you brave soldiers, both valiant and free, It’s for Independence we all now agree; Let us gird on our swords, and prepare to defend, Our liberty, property, ourselves and our friends. –Jonathan Mitchell Sewall July 2nd, 1776, the beginnings of the British fleet had arrived New York Harbor. Americans lined the piers …
Should African Americans Serve in the Continental Army? Washington and a new nation struggle with their convictions, morals, and necessity O’er the raging billows borne. Men, call’d Christians, bought & sold me, Paid my price in paltry gold; But though their’s they have enroll’d me, Minds are never to be sold. W. Cowper, Esq. 1774. Humanity was not ready to bestow …
Welcome my friends, from every land. Where freedom doth not reign; Oh! Hither fly from every clime, Sweet liberty to gain – John Mason Harlem Heights, ten miles north of New York City as the crow flies; September 16th 1776 – one hour before dawn. The Continental Army is entrenched on the high ground facing the British army, …
Two gentlemen called upon Captain Wilson and asked him to sign the agreement which a number of colonists had entered into to resist the mother country England to the last. This Captain Wilson positively refused to do. “I am an Englishman,” he said, “and my sympathies are wholly with my country. I do not say …