The American Revolution

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PRIMARY AND SECONDARY SOURCES

The American Revolution

from Private Yankee Doodle Dandy by Joseph Plumb Martin

Valley Forge Almost every one has heard of the soldiers of the Revolution being tracked by the blood of their feet on the frozen ground. This is literally true, and the thousandth part of their sufferings has not, nor ever will be told.… For on our march from the Valley Forge, though the Jerseys …a fourth part of the troops had not a scrip1 of anything but their ragged shirt flaps to cover their nakedness.…

How often have I had to lie whole stormy, cold nights in a wood, on a field, or a bleak hill, with such blankets and other clothing like them, with nothing but the canop of the heavens to cover me. All this too in the heart of winter, when a New England farmer, if his cattle had been in my situation, would not have slept a wink from sheer anxiety for them. Battle of Monmouth By this time the

British had come in contact with the New England forces at the fence, when a sharp conflict ensued.… We were immediately ordered from our old detachment and joined another, the whole composing a corps of about five hundred men. We instantly marched towards the enemy's right wing, which was in the orchard, and … into the open fields and formed our line.… As I passed through the orchard I saw a number of

the enemy lying under the trees, killed by our fieldpiece.2… The first shot they gave us from [a small piece of artillery] …cut off the thigh bone of a captain, just above the knee, and the whole heel of a private in the rear of him.… We then laid ourselves down under the fences and bushes to take a breath, for we had need of it. I presume everyone has heard of the heat of that day, but none can realize it that did not feel it. Fighting is hot work in cool weather, how much more so in such weather as it was on the [28th] of June, 1778. After the action in our part of the army had ceased, … I found [a] wounded captain … lying on the ground and begging his sergeant … to help him off the field or he should bleed to death.… I then offered to assist … in carrying him to a meetinghouse a short distance off, where the rest of the wounded men and surgeons were.… I … tarried a few minutes to see the wounded and two or three limbs amputated. from Joseph Plumb Martin, Private Yankee Doodle Dandy, ed. by George F. Scheer (Boston: Little, Brown, 1962). Reprinted in The Revolutionaries (Alexandria, Virginia: Time-Life Books, 1996).

1. scrip: scrap. 2. fieldpiece: artillery.

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McDougal Littell American History Ch 7 The American Revolution (1775–1783)

Primary and Secondary Sources Unit 3 Resource Book

Copyright © by McDougal Littell, a division of Houghton Mifflin Company.

In 1776, at the age of 15, Joseph Plumb Martin joined a Connecticut regiment to fight for American independence in the Revolutionary War. During the war, he fought in many battles, including Brooklyn, Monmouth, and Yorktown. In the first excerpt below, he describes his experiences at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, in the winter of 1777–1778. In the second excerpt, Martin describes his experiences at the Battle of Monmouth in New Jersey, June 1778.

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PRIMARY AND SECONDARY SOURCES, CONTINUED

CRITICAL THINKING 1. Find Main Ideas

What problems did Martin and the other soldiers face at

Valley Forge?

2. Summarize

What did Martin find lying beneath the trees in the orchard?

Why do you think Martin stayed with the army despite the problems he faced at Valley Forge?


3. Form Opinions

What was the order of events that Martin describes at the Battle of Monmouth?

4. Sequence Events



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An African-American Petition for Freedom

The petition of a great number of blacks detained in a state of slavery in the bowels3 of a free and Christian country humbly shows that your petitioners apprehend4 that they have in common with all other men in a natural and unalienable right to that freedom which the Great Parent of the universe has bestowed equally on all mankind and which they have never forfeited by any compact or agreement whatever. But they were unjustly dragged by the hand of cruel power from their dearest friends and some of them even torn from the embraces of their tender parents, from a populous, pleasant, and plentiful country and in violation of laws of nature and of nations and in defiance of all the tender feelings of humanity, brought here either to be sold like beasts of burden and, like them, condemned to slavery for life—among a people professing the mild religion of Jesus; a people not insensible5 of the secrets of rational being, nor without spirit to resent the unjust endeavors of others to reduce them to a state of bondage and subjection. Your Honor need not be informed that a life of slavery like that of your petitioners, deprived of every social privilege of everything requisite to render life tolerable, is far worse [than] nonexistence.

petition after petition presented by them to the legislative body of this state, and cannot but with grief reflect that their success has been but too similar. They cannot but express their astonishment that it has never been considered that every principle from which America has acted in the course of their unhappy difficulties with Great Britain pleads stronger than a thousand arguments in favor of your petitioners. They therefore humbly beseech Your Honors to give this petition its due weight and consideration, and cause an act of legislation to be passed whereby they may be restored to the enjoyments of that which is the natural right of all men, and that their children, who were born in this land of liberty, may not be held as slaves after they arrive at the age of [21] years. So may the inhabitants of this state, no longer chargeable with the inconsistency of acting themselves the part which they condemn and oppose in others, be prospered in their present glorious struggle for liberty and have those blessings for themselves. from Collections, Massachusetts Historical Society (Cambridge / Boston, 1795). ReprintedAnnals of America, Vol. 2 (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, 1968), 482–483.

In imitation of the laudable example of the good people of these states, your petitioners have long and patiently awaited the event of

3. bowels: the insides of. 4. apprehend: understand. 5. insensible: unaware.

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During the American Revolution, colonists fought for freedom from Great Britain. At the same time that colonists were demanding their freedom, they held 700,000 Africans and African Americans in slavery. Several of these enslaved people signed a petition requesting that Massachusetts grant them the liberty that they colonists wanted from Great Britian. The petition was submitted to the Massachusetts House of Representatives on January 13, 1777.

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CRITICAL THINKING

How were the signers of this petition “in imitation of the laudable example of the good people of these states?”

1. Find Main Ideas

2. Summarize

What plan for gradually ending slavery do the petitioners suggest?

What do the petitioners mean when they say the people of their state have been “acting themselves the part which they condemn and oppose in others?”


3. Draw Conclusions

How are the ideas expressed in the first sentence similar to those in the Declaration of Independence?

4. Compare



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