This week marks the 230th anniversary of America’s independence from Great Britain. Really? I can picture readers scurrying to consult some long-forgotten history text or the internet to find proof that I am wrong in making this assertion. Surely, I must be mistaken.
Most sources will cite July 4, 1776 as the actual date of our independence. After all, that was when it was declared, a little over 235 years ago. But, it is one thing for a nation to declare its independence and quite another for it to actually achieve it. Five long and brutal years of war would plague our new nation from that July day in 1776 until it could truly declare itself to be sovereign and independent.
During those years, military disasters, like the losses of New York, Philadelphia and Charleston, could have put an end to the rebellion. The Continental Army’s soldiers were also plagued by diseases. Smallpox and dysentery, as well as malnutrition, claimed more American lives than British bullets ever did. These diseases threatened to doom the American cause at every turn. But the American Revolutionaries did have a few things going for them. They had military victories like Trenton and Saratoga. They achieved a diplomatic coup when they convinced France to support their cause. And they possessed a unifying ideology of freedom and liberty that sparked people’s imaginations all over the world.
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