Tag: Chesapeake Bay

The Defense of the Upper Chesapeake: Maryland’s First Trial in the Revolutionary War

On By erwguestIn 1776, America 250, Emerging Revolutionary War, Memory, Navy, Revolutionary War, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Emerging Revolutionary War welcomes back guest historian Drew Palmer. He is the founder of Revolutionary Maryland; click here to learn more about that blog.

(Vallejo Image Galleries)

In the early evening of March 5, 1776, two armed boats left Annapolis to patrol the Chesapeake Bay. Captain John Pitt and Joseph Middleton were patrolling to prevent any British ships nearby from entering Maryland’s waters.  As they patrolled, they discovered an alarming sight: three British warships heading directly towards Annapolis. Middleton and Pitt rushed off to the Maryland Council of Safety’s chambers in Annapolis to report the startling news.1 In the coming days, Maryland was tested for the first time in the growing Revolutionary conflict.

The American rebellion had become a full-scale war by the spring of 1776. In early March, the siege of British-held Boston was about to end. Hundreds of miles south in Philadelphia, the Declaration of Independence was only four months away. In Maryland, politicians worked hard to maintain Maryland’s isolation from the worst of the conflict. In Virginia, a raiding war had already begun. Only two months before, the town of Norfolk, Virginia, was bombarded, leading to the destruction of the town. Along with Norfolk’s destruction, British attacks and raids were carried out throughout the lower Chesapeake Bay, along with a blockade. 2

Participating in British operations in the lower Chesapeake was Captain Mathew Squire of the British Royal Navy. For several months, Squire’s vessel, the  Otter, served as the headquarters of the exiled Virginia Governor, Lord Dunmore. From the Otter, British attacks and raids were launched on Patriot strongholds in the lower Chesapeake. By March, Squire had gained a reputation as a competent officer and ruthless raider of American shipping.3 Squire was heavily involved in the bombardment of Norfolk and an attempted attack on Hampton, Virginia. Though Squire’s area of operation had been centered on the lower Chesapeake, new intelligence pulled him northward into Maryland.

Continue reading “The Defense of the Upper Chesapeake: Maryland’s First Trial in the Revolutionary War” →

Final, Final Resting Place

On By Phill GreenwaltIn Battlefields & Historic Places, Battles, Common Soldier, Emerging Revolutionary War, Memory, War of 1812Leave a comment

Situated along East Monument Street is a stone monument surrounded by a black iron fence. A wayside informational marker is placed right outside the fence. Underneath this monument rests the remains of Daniel Wells and Henry McComas. On September 12, 1814, one of their firearms changed the entire scope of the Battle of North Point, part of the Chesapeake Bay Campaign during the War of 1812.

Both young militia members, sent to the frontlines to skirmish and harass the approaching British infantry, fired a musket round that slammed through the left elbow and into the chest of Major General Robert Ross, British land commander, mortally wounding him. Both Wells and McComas, aged 19 and 18 respectively, would be killed during the day’s fighting. A third soldier, Aquila Randall, also slain that day, has his own small monument and crediting him with firing the fateful shot.

Although most historians credit either Wells or McComas. Both soldiers were reinterred here, the second time their remains had been moved, in 1858 when the monument was completed and a funeral song and dramatic play rounded out the day’s commemoration.

The site is part of the Star-Spangled Banner National Historic Trail. To learn more about the trail, click here.

“Rev War Revelry” War on the Chesapeake!

On By erwpostIn Armies, Battlefields & Historic Places, Battles, British Leadership, Emerging Revolutionary War, Memory, Monuments, War of 1812Leave a comment

The Star-Spangled Banner and the burning of Washington City are the enduring legacies of the 1814 Chesapeake Campaign. These two events provide contrasting impressions of the American experience in the War of 1812. One conjures up an image of an American flag resiliently flying above Fort McHenry’s ramparts, denying the British entry into Baltimore. The other marks a low point in the American war effort, when politicians fled the nation’s capital followed by British soldiers, who burned many government buildings in the new nation’s capital city.

War along the Chesapeake Bay was not a limited episode in the War of 1812. There, Americans and British soldiers waged a hard and destructive war against one another. They fought pitched battles at Bladensburg and North Point. This campaign, remembered in popular memory for the creation of a national anthem and the burning of a nation’s capital, is more complex than just these two events.

Join Emerging Revolutionary War historians and guest historians John Nathan McDonald and George Best as we discuss the causes, movements, and impact of the 1814 Chesapeake Campaign. So, with your favorite beverage log onto our ERW Facebook page for the next historian happy hour as we discuss the obscure War of 1812 this Sunday, May 30, at 7 pm.

The Virginia Capes, Jutland, and American Destiny

On By Chris KolakowskiIn Battlefields & Historic Places, Battles, British Leadership, Campaigns1 Comment

At the end of last month and the beginning of this, I was in Britain marking the centennial of the Battle of Jutland, World War I’s largest naval battle. My great-grandfather was there as part of the Royal Navy, and it was meaningful in the extreme for me to be present at the commemorations.800px-BattleOfVirginiaCapes

The National Museum of the Royal Navy interpreted Jutland as “The Battle that Won the War,” and based its argument on the fact that the battle’s outcome led directly to German resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare, which in turn brought the United States into the war, with all the resulting titanic effects. In other words, a naval battle which didn’t feature a single American had a profound impact on U.S. history.

If that sounds familiar to Revolutionary War scholars, that’s because the same description applies to the 1781 Battle of the Virginia Capes. Let me explain.

Continue reading “The Virginia Capes, Jutland, and American Destiny” →