road and fired from the cover of the stone walls and trees. Gage made light of these encounters in his report to the British War Department. Not so the Americans. The news of Lexington and Concord spread with amazing rapidity, and soon all of New England was represented in the force gathered at Cambridge for the siege of Boston. Throughout the colonies the spirit of revolt was unleashed. Patriots seized the reins of government and royal officials found that their power had vanished almost over night. Instead of the redress of grievances hoped for, the Second Continental Congress found the country in tumult and war already begun.

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR CHAPTER VII

Channing, United States, III, covers the years 1761-1789. Howard, Preliminaries of the Revolution, and Becker, The Eve of the Revolution, deal with the years preceding the resort to arms. Van Tyne, McIlwain, and Egerton (see Bibliography for Chapter V) are indispensable for this chapter. Schlesinger, The Colonial Merchants and the American Revolution, is an excellent critical interpretation from the economic point of view. A brief sketch by the same writer is New Viewpoints, chap. 7.

The most satisfactory history of the whole revolutionary era is Fisher, The Struggle for American Independence. Fiske, The American Revolution, is rather popular and uncritical. Excellent histories by Englishmen are those of Trevelyan, The American Revolution, and Lecky, England in the Eighteenth Century. The chapters from the latter relating to the quarrel between England and the colonies have been published as The American Revolution (edited by J. A. Woodburn).

The American Statesmen series contains Tyler, Patrick Henry, Hosmer, Samuel Adams, and Morse, John Adams. A standard life of Dickinson is Stillé, Life and Times of John Dickinson. A new and adequate life of Otis is badly needed.

Lincoln, The Revolutionary Movement in Pennsylvania, gives some insight into the division of opinion in the colonies.

CHAPTER VIII

THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE

The Congress assembled May 10, 1775. Few if any members desired independence as the goal of the struggle in which the country had become involved. Two months before, Franklin declared that he had never heard a word from any one in favor of independence. John Jay said later that the first talk of separation was heard in the autumn of 1775.

In explanation of resistance to a King to whom they professed loyalty the Congress issued a Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking up Arms. This document placed all the blame upon the ministers. "We are reduced to the alternative of chusing an unconditional submission to the tyranny of irritated ministers, or resistance by force. . . . The latter is our choice. . . . We have counted the cost of this contest, and find nothing so dreadful as voluntary slavery. . . .' In the hope of retaining the moral support of English Whigs, who in Parliament had "nobly and strenuously asserted the justice of our cause," the Declaration assured them that "we mean not to dissolve that union which has so long and so happily subsisted between us," and concluded with a prayer that the Ruler of the Universe may "dispose our adversaries to reconciliation on reasonable terms." Had the British government at this time shown the conciliatory disposition which it did after Burgoyne's defeat (see page 154), it can hardly be doubted that separation would have been avoided.

Pending its response Congress did not shrink from military measures. It took control over the army at Cambridge, appointed officers, and called upon the provincial governments to raise arms and men. The conditions of American life had not developed tested military men among the Whigs, and Congress was compelled to rely upon civilians as officers. Henry Knox, who served with the artillery throughout the war, was a young

Boston bookseller. Nathanael Greene, who won a reputation second only to that of Washington, was a Rhode Island blacksmith who was expelled from the Society of Friends because of his eagerness to fight his country's battles. Washington, notwithstanding the fact that he had served with distinction in the French and Indian War, and that his military experience was quite as extensive as that of any of the Whig leaders, was himself essentially a civilian. In choosing him as commander-inchief Congress could not foresee that he was destined to win fame as one of the great commanders of modern times. Indeed, his appointment was due in part to the fear that jealousy would prevent southern Whigs from serving wholeheartedly under a northern leader. Considerations of expediency, and faith in Washington's integrity and judgment, moved Con

gress quite as much as confidence in his military capacity. As it proved, his moral qualities quite as much as his generalship made his name an anchor for the hopes of his countrymen in the dark days of the war.

Events now moved rapidly. Before Washington could reach Cambridge the Battle of Bunker Hill had been fought. In the middle of June the Americans tried to force Gage from Boston by planting batteries on high ground in Charleston. The position was on a peninsula, separated from Boston by Charles River, and the Americans might have been forced to retire by the simple and safe expedient of threatening their single narrow path of retreat along the isthmus. Gage preferred to show his belief in the superiority of the British regulars by sending Sir William Howe to take the position by assault. This was accomplished, but only after two repulses, and then only because of the exhaustion of the ammunition of the Americans. They lost less than