The United States Army was born on June 14, 1775, when the Second Continental Congress formally organized the militia units surrounding Boston into a standing army. But they weren’t the United States Army yet—the United States didn’t formally exist. They were the Continental Army.
Congress appointed George Washington their commander. He arrived at his new command in mid-July. Shaping a collection of volunteer militias into a field army is no small task. Washington was a talented leader, but he was no professional soldier. He nevertheless forced the British out of Boston and moved south to occupy New York City.
But besieging Boston and defending New York against the world’s most professional army were two different things. British Regulars, supported by the Royal Navy, drove Washington off Long Island. Yet he masterfully escaped through the fog to Manhattan, right under the Navy’s guns.
Still, the Americans lacked the numbers and the discipline to defend Manhattan. British forces under General William Howe drove them into New Jersey.
July 4th, 1776 came and went. The Continental Army now fought for a new nation, not just rebellious colonies. But by year’s end, Howe’s veterans had pushed them out of New Jersey into Pennsylvania.
Morale was low. Washington’s experienced troops were nearing the end of their enlistments. They lacked food, clothing, and supplies—and they were unpaid. The Revolution was faltering.
So, Washington did what any great American would do: he attacked. Not only did he attack, he piled his troops into boats, crossed the ice-filled Delaware River, and assaulted his enemies in their camps—on Christmas Night.
The resulting Battle of Trenton sparked a string of victories that kicked the British and their German mercenaries all the way back to New York. The Continental Army had retaken New Jersey and saved the Revolution.
The Continental Army Wins a Stunning Victory
Washington slowly molded the army over two difficult years. Despite the success in New Jersey in late 1776 and into 1777, the Americans suffered mostly defeat through the summer. But autumn brought a change in fortunes. The British sought to take the Hudson River Valley, severing radically revolutionary New England from the other colonies.
Washington shrewdly judged that he could split his army, dispatching General Horatio Gates to block British General John Burgoyne’s force moving south from Canada toward New York City. Washington himself laid siege to Howe in Philadelphia.
Gates, aided by an ambitious subordinate named Benedict Arnold, not only blocked Burgoyne, but surrounded him and forced his surrender in October. The Americans had defeated the British in open battle for the first time. Saratoga marked the war’s turning point, causing France to join the Americans against the British. Spain and the Netherlands eventually followed, dispersing British resources, including its all-important navy.
Washington failed to dislodge Howe, but the tide was slowly turning, even if it was not yet apparent. The Continental Army went into winter quarters at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.
Becoming a Professional Army
The Valley Forge winter was transformative in two ways. First, the shared hardships of bitter cold, inadequate rations, and general hardship created a camaraderie and even a sense of martyrdom for their revolutionary cause.
Second, the Continental soldiers received their first professional training, thanks to Prussian officer Baron Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben.
Von Steuben had soldiered with Frederick the Great, and he imparted cutting-edge knowledge and practices to Washington’s army at a time when it was sorely needed. Saratoga was a great victory, but defeating one British force didn’t win the war.
Close order drill and weapons training were vital if the Continentals hoped to defeat the British in the field. British field armies included regiments of elite light infantry and grenadiers. Their tactics were brutally effective: infantry pinned the enemy in place through maneuver and repeated musket volleys, then grenadiers—big, seasoned veterans—closed with the bayonet to break the line. Up to that point, the Continentals and militia had lacked the discipline and cohesion to stand against them.
Von Steuben rewrote the training manual, tailoring it to the strengths of his new charges. One of his most important innovations was simple but impactful: he added the word “aim” to the fire command, increasing accuracy among already proficient Americans. He also improved mobility by increasing the marching pace from 60 to 75 two-foot steps per minute, and upping double-time to 120.
The Continentals learned how to march in column and line and deploy quickly. Skirmishers were taught to protect the army’s flanks and reintegrate when the troops deployed for action.
Von Steuben also stressed the importance of competent noncommissioned officers, stressing the need for such men to be appointed and promoted based on merit alone. He wrote, “The order and discipline of a regiment depends so much on their behaviour, that too much care cannot be taken in preferring none to that trust but those who by their merit and good conduct are entitled to it.”
Von Steuben himself created and trained a model company in his new doctrine. The model company’s officers, NCOs, and men then spent six weeks training the rest of the army while von Steuben wrote the manual on which their training was based. He understood the American mindset well. Where European soldiers were expected to obey without explanation, he noted that American soldiers must be told not just what to do—but why.
The Army still uses some of von Steuben’s training techniques today. The traditions he imparted to the Americans make him a vital, though sometimes overlooked, part of the Army’s history. The Continental Army emerged from Valley Forge leaner and more capable than ever before.
Continental Army Disadvantages
Despite their new professionalism, the Continental Army still walked a difficult road. They were underpaid, only earning a little over six dollars per month—when they were paid at all. Congress lacked the authority to tax and often had no money to meet payroll. States kicked in some bonuses, but the soldiers went unpaid most of the time. Washington constantly begged for private donations to at least pay his men something. Congress and several states offered pensions and free plots of land at war’s end. Of the two, the land was more of a sure thing than the pensions.
Low pay contributed to the fact that the army was never at its fully authorized strength. Another factor was the looser discipline and better bonuses in the various militia companies. But Continental soldiers disdained the militia, calling them “part-time soldiers.” Washington shared their sentiments. Despite leading militia units during the French & Indian War, Washington all but despised the militia for their often undisciplined and unreliable performance.
But the militia units were absolutely necessary to the American cause. Continental commanders used them as support and reconnaissance troops, and Washington relied on them to hold down the countryside while the army was campaigning elsewhere. Militia units also fought and won key battles on their own, as at Kings Mountain in 1780. They also played a vital role in the American victories at Cowpens in January of 1781 and Yorktown later that year.
Still, Continental soldiers were different from the militia. Belief in the cause drove them and sustained them, a tradition that still permeates America’s all-volunteer force.
Pressuring the British
Von Steuben’s reforms and a change in enlistment terms created a better Continental Army in 1778. Previously, soldiers had enlisted for just one year, meaning Washington lost his soldiers just as they were becoming proficient. New enlistments lasted three years or the duration of the war, whichever came first. That change meant Washington had veteran troops with which to campaign and fight—and those troops also had time to impart their knowledge to the younger soldiers.
Despite these improvements, British professionalism and discipline was still superior. Washington kept to his “Fabian Strategy” of preserving his army by avoiding battle except where he had a clear advantage. The British were forced to continue an increasingly expensive war so long as the Continentals remained in the field.
The Americans controlled the countryside, thanks to the militia. As a result, British forces were irretrievably tied to port cities where the navy could supply them. But their 3,000-mile supply line across the Atlantic was a glaring weakness. Most of their food and other necessities had to come from Europe, and much of the food arrived spoiled.
The British hope of a Loyalist uprising outside the cities never materialized, and Washington leveraged that advantage to bring pressure on the British logistical system. He was aided by the French, Spanish, and Dutch navies, who forced the British to deploy extra ships to protect supply lines worldwide, thus dispersing their strength.
The Continental Army’s Final Campaign
The British were making no progress in the north, mainly bottled up in New York. So, they shifted to a Southern Strategy in 1780. General Charles Cornwallis led British forces from Charleston, South Carolina, establishing fortified inland outposts. These were meant to protect Loyalists who would rise up to quell the American militias and take back the countryside. Once South Carolina was pacified, the British would move north and repeat the process in North Carolina.
But the Loyalist uprising never happened, and American guerilla leaders like Francis Marion and Thomas Sumter seemingly grew stronger. The campaign in South Carolina was more like a civil war insurgency than anything else. Cornwallis misread the situation entirely, believing that the growing American strength was coming from conventional forces in North Carolina.
Cornwallis marched his army north, where he won a major victory at Camden over the Continentals led by Gates. Believing that crushing Gates’ army entirely would protect the South Carolina Loyalists, Cornwallis pursued the Americans to the north.
The campaign swung back and forth, with American irregular units terrorizing South Carolina Loyalists and the American militia’s victory at Kings Mountain. Cornwallis returned to South Carolina for a time. But he still believed the key was destroying American support from North Carolina. He turned north again.
Continentals and militia routed Cornwallis’ cavalry at Cowpens, while Cornwallis himself won a close-run battle over General Nathaniel Greene’s Continentals at Guilford Courthouse, North Carolina. Guilford Courthouse cost Cornwallis dearly, and he moved to the port of Wilmington to link up with the navy for supplies.
Greene moved south to clear South Carolina. He lost every battle he fought there. But the British victories were too expensive. They eventually withdrew to Charleston, and Loyalist militias in the countryside collapsed.
Winning the War
Against the orders of his superior, General Sir Henry Clinton in New York, Cornwallis marched his army into Virginia. He hoped to protect the South by crushing American forces there. He never understood that the Southern Campaign was an insurgency that he could not defeat by conventional methods.
The reinforced British ensconced themselves at Yorktown. But a brilliant deception by Washington won the war. He secretly moved most of his army south, while maintaining the appearance of staying in his fortifications around New York.
Controlling the countryside once again paid off. After a grueling march, a combined force of 20,000 Continentals, militia, and French troops besieged Cornwallis at Yorktown. At the same time, the French Fleet sealed off the Chesapeake Bay, preventing Clinton from relieving the beleaguered British. Washington’s march was the largest and longest troop movement of the war.
The siege lasted three weeks as Washington’s army rained artillery into the British works. A stealthy night assault on October 14, 1781, saw vicious hand-to-hand combat as the Continentals and French troops attacked with bayonets, breaching the British lines and taking two redoubts. Washington’s army commanded the position.
After a final, futile counterattack, Cornwallis asked for terms on October 17. Washington denied honorable terms, citing a similar British refusal at Charleston. The formal surrender came two days later.
Word of Cornwallis’ surrender sent shock waves through London. Parliament authorized a peace settlement, and the Prime Minister, Lord North, resigned. It would take two more years of diplomacy, but the 1783 Treaty of Paris was eventually signed. In it, Britain formally recognized American independence.
The Continental Army in American History
The Continental Army was America’s first professional fighting force. Despite the mythology surrounding the militias, the Continentals bore the brunt of the fighting.
The British Army was the finest in the world at the time. But Britain was pulled in many directions once France, Spain, and the Netherlands joined the war. Britain not only faced losing the American colonies, but they were also threatened in India and elsewhere.
Though outnumbered, underpaid, and often lacking adequate supplies, the Continentals became a tough, veteran force that held its own when it had to. Continental soldiers embodied the spirit of the Revolution far more than the militias. They ranged in age from mid-teens to men over 40 and were the first racially integrated American army, with black and native American soldiers serving alongside their white comrades. Such integration would not appear again until the Korean War.
In all, some 230,000 men served in the Continental Army between 1775 and 1783. Even so, the army and the militias never exceeded one-sixteenth of America’s available military-age manpower. Congress disbanded the Continental Army in 1783, but these soldiers rightly deserve to be the symbol of the American Revolution. 250 years ago, they began the legacy of selfless service and combat tenacity that marks today’s American soldier. They are the worthy forebears of today’s United States Army.
