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... accesses. The native people coined this new strategy called guerrilla warfare. The basis of this style of warfare is to quickly attack your enemy and run away. The Americans carefully selected their battleground and time of attack as much as possible in guerrilla warfare so that they could have every advantage possible so that they could have a chance to win. Two such instances where the time of day and choice of terrain were the complete reasons for British defeat were at Stony Point and at Paulus Hook.
The battle at Stony Point took place on the night of July fifteenth and ended the morning of July sixteenth. Washington assigned "Mad Anthony" Wayne to this attack. Wayne had 1, 350 men that were given to him for this attack. He set his men in two tight lines and marched towards the fort in and camouflaged by the night darkness. The first men to raid the fort attacked with their bayonets. The British fort soon went into chaos and surrendered very quickly.
In total this battle cost the Americans 15 lives, they killed 63 British soldiers, and General Clinton was forced to surrender the fort to the Americans. Another battle that was won by time of day and terrain was in Paulus Hook, New Jersey. Harry Lee took a small squad and attacked the 200 men post. He attacked at dawn and caught the British completely off guard and shocked them.
He killed or captured almost everybody at the fort. He retreated with everyone within two hours of the attack to make sure no British reinforcements arrived. There were many different guerilla warfare styles and strategies over the course of the revolutionary war. One such strategy was to have two rows of riflemen fire and then run away. The British would then try to catch them and the troops would be lead into a trap waiting for them. Two of the best, and most successful, uses of this strategy were at the Battle of Cowpens and the Battle at Guilford Court.
The Battle of Cowpens physically took place on January 17 but was set up between January 2, 1781 and the day of the actual battle on January 17. The battle of Cowpens was a major battle of the war against the British for conquest as much as morals. Previous to the battle General Greene had separated his army of about 1, 700 into two divisions. His army would have 1, 100 and General Morgan would have about 600 men.
General Cornwallis thought this to be a very foolish move and sent out Banastre Trarleton, one of the most fearsome British officers with 1, 100 men. Morgan knew he would lose against Trarleton at his present so he traveled to Cowpens South Carolina to wait for the onslaught that they knew was coming. On the way to Cowpens Morgan picked up enough men to almost evenly match the British man for man. He knew that Trarleton would attack frontally so he prepared a strategy that would be able to handle it. He knew and planned on the fact that his militia would retreat at first sign of charge so he laid out a strategy that would take this into account.
He had his militia stand in two rows. All of the militia that were in the rows were instructed to fire twice and leave. This strategy worked better then Morgan could have ever planned. His two rows of men, totaling about 400 men knocked back and completely destroyed the first British charge and then the militia retreated. Leaving his other men to charge at the British, General Morgan completely humiliated Trarleton. Morgan had killed or captured more than three fourths of his force.
Trarleton had only escaped with 140 horsemen. The same strategy was implemented at the battle at Guilford Court. British General Cornwallis wanted revenge on General Morgan for what he did to the British at Cowpens. So Cornwallis had his army of 2, 500 men trail General Morgan's army who chose to go north after their victory and rejoin with General Greene's army. He trailed their army for nearly two months and after losing at least 500 men trailing Morgan and Greene, he decided to go in a complete circle back to Hillsborough.
There General Nathan Greene was waiting for him. He had applied their previous strategy in the battle at Cowpens to this battle. General Greene started with 2, 000 men after the Battle at Cowpens and had increased his numbers up to over 4, 500 men. He decided to place a good number of his militia in two forward lines and the continental part of his army in a third row. He called Colonel Washington to protect his left flank and "Light Horse" Harry Lee to protect his right flank. After the quick attack Greene decided to leave and not pursue a fight.
He knew that the losses that they would have suffered would not have been worth the fight but during this battle they killed about 300 British troops. This battle at Guilford Court caused Cornwallis to retreat all the way back to Wilmington and then to Virginia where the demise of the British was. Another reason the Americans won certain battles over the British army was that the British did not take the American resistance with total seriousness causing them to do some stupid things do to poor judgement. One example of a battle when the British lost due to their stupidity was in the Battle at Bennington. The British were heading towards Vermont to obtain horses, food, and other supplies to aid the German mercenaries who had been without horses for a great length of time. Lieutenant Colonel Friedrich Baum was instructed " not to risk heavy losses but to scare and despoil the Vermonters." Baum left his camp with about 700 men and two cannons, which was thought to be more than enough to fight any small resistance that they might face.
His first defiance of his orders was when Baum encountered a force of 200 men sent by Brigadier General John Stark. After the battle he was informed that these men were part of a militia force gathering at Bennington. He decided to press towards Bennington and destroy the force, even though it went against his orders again. Baum then marched towards Bennington. On his way there Baum saw two contingents of men going towards his rear and presumed that they were Tories that were going to flank the enemy and didn't give them a second thought after seeing them. When Baum approached Bennington, Stark order his men in front to charge, at the same time the two contingents of men already behind Baum also attack him and Baum was massacred.
If Baum had taken any care as to even think of the contingents traveling behind him he could have possibly beaten the Americans at Bennington. But because of his disobedience of orders and his ignorance he lost the battle. The British, with all their money, men, supplies, and power couldn't overcome what little the Americans had. The Patriots realized, from their earliest difficulties, to capitalize on the enemy's weakness. The Americans devised new tactics to overcome the British in their traditional Join style of warfare. The Americans used all that they possibly had to beat British.
What drove the Americans to create these new strategies, though, was their desire; their desire to overcome the British is what gave the colonial fighters their true advantage during the American Revolutionary War. Bibliography 1. Alden John, A History of the American Revolution, Borzoi Books, New York, 1969 2. Cook Don, The Long Fuse How England lost the American colonies 1760 - 1785, Atlantic Monthly Press, New York, 1995 3. Nash, Jeffery, et al. , The American Society, HapperCollinsCollege Publisher 4. Nettels Curtis P. , The Roots of American Civilization A History of American Life F.
S. Cross & CO New York 1945 5. Ward Christopher, The War of the Revolution Volume One, The Macmillan Company, New York, 1952 6. Ward Christopher, The War of the Revolution Volume Two, The Macmillan Company, New York, 1952 7. web 20 Revolution/Art. htm 8.
web 9. Brainard Rick, 18 th century History, web bl american. htm
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Research essay sample on Company New York Time Of Day
