1775: The Start of the Revolution

Podcast Transcript

If you were to ask most people what year they associate with the American Revolution, it would be 1776. That was the year that the Continental Congress declared Independence.

However, 1776 wasn’t the start of the revolution, nor was it the end of the revolution. In fact, if it hadn’t been for the Declaration of Independence, it would have gone down as a pretty horrible year for the revolution.

For my money, the most interesting year of the revolution was actually the first year, 1775.

Learn more about 1775 and the start of the American Revolution on the 1775th episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

I had many people suggest I do something revolution-oriented for episode 1776 of the podcast.

However, to be honest, I’ve already done several episodes that have focused on 1776.

So instead, I though I’d so something special one episode early and cover the events of 1775, which was a much better year for the revolution than 1776 was.

So lets start by looking at where things were at in the colonies at the start of 1775.

To understand 1775, one must appreciate the years leading up to it. The roots of conflict began with British attempts to raise revenue from the colonies following the expensive Seven Years’ War aka the French and Indian War from 1756 to 1763. Laws like the Stamp Act in 1765 and Townshend Acts in 1767 imposed taxes on the colonies without their consent—fueling the colonial slogan “No taxation without representation.”

Tensions were especially high in Boston which saw events such as the The Boston Massacre in 1770 and the Boston Tea Party in 1773.

In response, Parliament passed the Coercive Acts in 1774, called the Intolerable Acts by colonists, which closed Boston Harbor, altered Massachusetts’ charter, and expanded the powers of royal officials. These laws enraged colonists and fostered unity through the creation of the First Continental Congress in September 1774, where colonies coordinated resistance.

By early 1775, colonial militias were drilling regularly, especially in New England. Massachusetts was seen as the epicenter of resistance. British General Thomas Gage, the royal governor of Massachusetts, sought to restore control but was increasingly isolated in Boston, where British troops were garrisoned.

In February, the British Parliament declared Massachusetts to be in a state of rebellion. This declaration gave General Gage authority to use force to suppress resistance. Meanwhile, colonial leaders such as Samuel Adams and John Hancock began preparing for the possibility of war.

This was taking things well beyond dumping tea in the harbor. The militias were now getting ready for actual violence and combat.

All these years of tension and conflict eventually came to a head on April 18.

In an effort to reassert royal control of Massachusetts, General Gage, ordered a force of approximately 700 British regulars to march from Boston to Concord to seize and destroy colonial arms and ammunition hidden there.

The British also hoped to capture two prominent patriot leaders, Samuel Adams and John Hancock, who were believed to be in the area.

News of the British movement spread quickly due to a network of riders, most famously Paul Revere and William Dawes, who warned the countryside of the advancing troops.

At dawn, the British column reached the town of Lexington, where around seventy colonial militia, known as Minutemen, had gathered on the town green. The British commander ordered them to disperse, and in the tense standoff that followed, a shot was fired—by whom is still unknown.

That musket shot, know to history as the “shot heard ’round the world,” triggered a brief skirmish that left eight colonists dead and several wounded. The British then continued their march to Concord.

Upon reaching Concord, the British found and destroyed some supplies but encountered a much larger force of colonial militia at the North Bridge. This time, the colonists fired the first volley, driving the British back. As the redcoats began their retreat to Boston, thousands of colonial militiamen converged on the area.

Along the return route, British troops were ambushed repeatedly from behind stone walls, trees, and houses in a long, deadly running battle. By the time they reached Boston, the British had suffered 73 killed and over 170 wounded or missing. Colonial losses were about 90 in total.

This was something that the colonists couldn’t come back from and something that the British couldn’t let slide.

Prior to the events of April 18, the Continental Congress had agreed to reconvene in May.

However, the outbreak of violence at Lexington and Concord turned what had been a political crisis into a military one. The news of the bloodshed rapidly reached other colonies, galvanizing public opinion and prompting local militias to mobilize

Many in other colonies now believed that full-scale war was imminent. In this context, the Second Continental Congress assembled in Philadelphia on May 10, 1775, with delegates from all thirteen colonies, including newcomers such as John Hancock and Thomas Jefferson.

Little did they know that the Second Continental Congress would be in session for the next six years during the entire duration of the war.

While the Continental Congress was not initially conceived as a revolutionary body, the events in Massachusetts forced its members to address the realities of armed conflict.

Within weeks, the Congress assumed the functions of a national government: it organized the Continental Army, appointed George Washington as its commander, began issuing paper currency, and negotiated with foreign powers. What began as a forum for coordinating protests had transformed into the de facto governing body of a nation on the brink of independence.

Back in Boston, things didn’t stop after Lexington and Concord.

Thousands of colonial militiamen from Massachusetts and neighboring New England colonies quickly mobilized and surrounded the city of Boston, where the bulk of the British Army in North America was stationed under General Gage.

The British troops, having fought a grueling retreat from Concord back to Boston, found themselves effectively trapped within the city, which was situated on a peninsula connected to the mainland by a narrow neck of land.

The colonial forces established fortified positions around the city, cutting off British land access and creating a loose ring of entrenchments from towns like Roxbury and Cambridge. Although the colonial army was untrained and poorly equipped compared to the professional British soldiers, it quickly grew into a formidable force of over 15,000 men, unified by shared outrage over the bloodshed at Lexington and Concord. With this, the Siege of Boston began—not as a single battle but as a prolonged standoff.

During the months that followed, both sides dug in and prepared for future action. The British, confined to Boston and reliant on the sea for supplies, attempted to maintain control of the city, while the colonial forces, lacking artillery and training, avoided direct assault. The situation escalated with the Battle of Bunker Hill on June 17, 1775, when the British launched a costly frontal assault against American positions on Breed’s Hill.

Though the British technically won the battle by taking the ground, they suffered heavy casualties and failed to break the siege.

George Washington was appointed the head of the Continental Army on June 15….an army that didn’t really even exist at this point.

Washington officially took command of the army on July 3, 1775, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, just outside Boston.

Upon his arrival, this outsider from Virginia found a large but disorganized collection of New England militias encircling the city. One of his first tasks was to impose discipline, establish a unified command structure, and coordinate the disparate colonial forces into a more effective fighting force.

Other actions were being taken outside of Boston. In particular, Fort Ticonderoga.

The fort, located on the western shore of Lake Champlain in New York, had been built by the French during the French and Indian War and was now held by a small British garrison. Strategically positioned at a key point between Canada and the Hudson River Valley, Ticonderoga controlled a vital corridor for movement between British Canada and the northern colonies.

More importantly, at the time, it housed a large supply of heavy artillery—cannons and mortars that the Americans desperately needed to break the stalemate around Boston.

The plan to seize the fort was initiated by a group of New England patriots led by Ethan Allen, the leader of the Green Mountain Boys, a militia force from what is now Vermont. Benedict Arnold, who had been commissioned by the Massachusetts Committee of Safety to lead an expedition to the fort, arrived independently and clashed with Allen over command. Despite tensions between them, the two men agreed to a joint operation.

In the early hours of May 10, a small force of about 80 to 100 men crossed Lake Champlain under the cover of darkness and launched a surprise attack on the fort. The British garrison, numbering only about two dozen sleepy and unprepared soldiers, was caught completely off guard. Without a shot being fired, the Americans entered the fort and demanded its surrender.

Under orders from George Washington, Colonel Henry Knox would later transport dozens of those captured cannons by ox-drawn sleds over 300 miles of rough terrain and frozen rivers later that winter, to Boston.

Despite all the violence, many colonists still thought that peace was possible.

On July 5, the Continental Congress adopted the Olive Branch Petition, a final appeal to King George III to restore peace.

However, on July 6, the very next day, Congress issued the Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms, justifying armed resistance.

It didn’t really matter because King George III rejected the Olive Branch Petition and issued the Proclamation of Rebellion in August, declaring the colonies in open revolt and signaling that negotiation was over.

The Siege of Boston lasted through the rest of 1775 and into 1776. It ended on March 17 when Washington, in one of the most brilliant maneuvers of the war, moved 50 heavy cannon overnight under the cover of darkness into positions at Dorchester Heights, which was within range of the British ships in the harbor.

General William Howe, the leader of the British forces in Boston who had arrived there in May, realized the gravity of the situation and evacuated the city.

The American Colonists started the revolution on a high note in 1775. They had an element of surprise and home-field advantage. However, once the British were able to regroup, things began to go against the Americans.

1776 saw the disastrous Battle of Long Island and the beginnings of five years of fighting a Fabian strategy of holding off losing until they had the opportunity to win….which is what eventually happened in 1781 at Yorktown.

The last day of 1775 foreshadowed how the next year of the war would go.

With the approval of the Continental Congress, two separate American forces converged on Quebec City. One was led by General Richard Montgomery, who advanced from Fort Ticonderoga along Lake Champlain, and the other was commanded by Benedict Arnold, who undertook a grueling march through the Maine wilderness to approach Quebec from the east.

On the night of December 31, 1775, during a blizzard, the Americans launched a two-pronged assault on the city.

The attack quickly fell apart. Montgomery was killed almost immediately by cannon fire while attempting to advance along a narrow pass. His column, leaderless and under heavy fire, retreated. Arnold’s force made deeper progress into the city but was eventually pinned down and surrounded. Arnold was wounded in the leg and had to be carried from the field.

Command fell to Daniel Morgan, who continued the fight but was ultimately forced to surrender with the remaining troops. In total, over 400 Americans were taken prisoner, and the assault was a decisive failure.

1775 was not just the first year of the Revolution, but also arguably, the most important.

It was the year when colonist swith a collection of grievances started the journey towards becoming an independent country.

While the events of 1776 might get most of the attention, they never would have happened without the events of 1775.