Battle of Saratoga
A British army surrendered at Saratoga in October 1777 and France entered the war within four months. The plan had been to cut New England off from the other colonies by three converging columns — Burgoyne south from Canada down the Hudson, St Leger east along the Mohawk, and Howe north from New York. Howe went to Philadelphia instead, having received permission for his own campaign and no clear instruction to support the other, which is the failure the whole thing turned on. Burgoyne moved slowly with an enormous baggage train, retook Ticonderoga easily, and then spent weeks cutting a road through forest while American militia felled trees across it. Two detachments were destroyed: a foraging column at Bennington in August, and St Leger's force turned back in the Mohawk valley. The American army under Gates entrenched on Bemis Heights above the river, and the fighting on 19 September and 7 October was directed largely by Benedict Arnold, who had been relieved of command and rode into the action anyway. Burgoyne, with his supply gone and no relief coming, surrendered some 5,900 men on 17 October under a convention that was later repudiated. The news reached Paris in December and Vergennes signed the treaties of alliance in February 1778. That converted a colonial rebellion into a global war with Spain and the Dutch following, and it is why the French fleet was at the Chesapeake in 1781. Arnold, who had done most of the fighting and none of the reporting, was passed over again for the credit and changed sides three years later. The monument on the field commemorates his leg and does not give his name.
- Year: 1777 CE
- Category: Military
