Notes

King George III

The American Revolution began on April 19, 1775, with the Battles of Lexington and Concord. The next year, the Declaration of Independence laid out the Americans’ case for freedom, portraying George III as an inflexible tyrant who had squandered his right to govern the colonies. In reality the situation was more complex: Parliamentary ministers, not the crown, were responsible for colonial policies, though George still had means of direct and indirect influence.

The king was reluctant to come to terms with his army’s defeat at Yorktown in 1781. He drafted an abdication speech but in the end decided to defer to Parliament’s peace negotiations. The 1783 Treaty of Paris recognized the United States and ceded Florida to Spain.
Phillis Wheatly

In 1773, Phillis Wheatley became the first African American woman,
and the first slave, to publish a book of poetry. John Wheatley freed Phillis in 1773. She
wrote a second book, but died before it was published.
James Armistead

James, a slave of William Armistead in New Kent County, Virginia,
volunteered to spy for the Continental army commander General Lafayette. James soon
became a servant to British general Lord Cornwallis, who asked him to spy on the
Americans! As a double agent, James gave unimportant information to Cornwallis, while
keeping Lafayette informed about British troop strength and positions. James Armistead
remained enslaved after the war. In 1784, Lafayette wrote to the Virginia General
Assembly, describing his valuable service and asking that he be freed. In 1786, he was
freed—and from then on, he called himself James Lafayette.
African American

Slaves and free blacks fought for the Continentals and for the British during the Revolutionary War. At Monmouth, African Americans faced each other. That battle did not matter much, nor, at the end of the war, did it much matter for which side blacks bore arms, at least as it concerned their freedom.

Those who sided with the British were told, more or less, that they were manumitted and would be given land and self-government. They had a better hope for freedom with the British than they had with Americans. But the British found it easier to promise liberty and land than to provide them. Slaves who departed with the redcoats when the conflict was over were in their new lands—Canada, England, Australia, and Sierra Leone—still treated much as they had been before.
Joseph Brant

On this day in 1807, Mohawk Chief Thayendanegea, also known by his English name, Joseph Brant, dies at his home in Burlington, Ontario. Before dying, he reportedly said, “Have pity on the poor Indians. If you have any influence with the great, endeavour to use it for their good.”

Brant ranked among Britain’s best commanders during the American War for Independence. He was an educated Christian and Freemason who studied directly with Eleazer Wheelock at Moor’s Indian Charity School, the parent institution of Dartmouth College. His older sister Mary was founding father Sir William Johnson’s common-law wife and also played a significant role in colonial and revolutionary Indian affairs.

The Iroquois, an alliance of Native Americans including the Mohawk, attempted to maintain neutrality at the beginning of War for Independence, but by 1777, Joseph Brant had led the Iroquois into an alliance with Britain. He, like most Native Americans, saw Great Britain as their last defense against the land-hungry colonial settlers who were encroaching into their ancestral territory.

The following summer, on July 20, 1779, Brant’s party of 90 Tories and Loyalist Iroquois executed a successful raid in the Neversink Valley of New York, during which they destroyed a school and a church, as well as farms in Peenpack and Mahackamack. When the Patriot militia responded by attempting to ambush Brant as he traveled up the Delaware River on July 22, Brandt again defeated them, killing between 45 and 50 Patriots at what is known as the Battle of Minisink.