The Battle of Saratoga

The plan is drawn in London: split the colonies in two. General Burgoyne marches south from Canada with a glittering army — regulars, German troops, cannon, and Native allies — bound for Albany. But the northern wilderness is not London. Every felled tree and flooded road steals a day.

In 1777 Gen. John Burgoyne led ~7,000+ troops south from Canada to split New England from the colonies. The wilderness slowed his advance to a crawl. Nearly 249 years ago.

As he crawls, we gather. Farmers with fowling pieces, Continentals, and Morgan's riflemen — men who can hit an officer at three hundred yards. We block the road at Bemis Heights and dig in on the high ground. Burgoyne's supply line back to Canada stretches until it is a thread.

American forces under Gen. Horatio Gates fortified Bemis Heights, reinforced by Daniel Morgan's sharpshooting riflemen. Militia swelled the army as Burgoyne's supply line frayed.

September nineteenth. They come at us through a farm clearing — Freeman's Farm. Morgan's riflemen slip into the trees and start dropping every man with a sash or a gorget. The fighting rolls back and forth over the stubble all afternoon. They hold the field at dusk, but it costs them men they cannot replace.

At the First Battle of Saratoga (Freeman's Farm, 19 Sept 1777), Morgan's riflemen targeted British officers. Britain held the field but suffered heavy, irreplaceable losses.

Then we wait, and the trap tightens. Burgoyne digs in, hoping for help from New York that will never come. His horses die; his men go on half-rations, then less. In our camp, General Arnold rages at General Gates for holding us back. The whole army can feel it: the British are trapped, and they know it too.

Burgoyne entrenched, awaiting relief that never came, as his supplies dwindled. In the American camp, Benedict Arnold clashed bitterly with the cautious Gates.

October seventh, Burgoyne throws the dice — a probe in force at Bemis Heights. Arnold has been stripped of his command, but he cannot sit still. He gallops onto the field without orders, and the men roar and follow him. He leads the charge that breaks their line and storms the redoubt before a ball shatters his leg.

At the Second Battle (Bemis Heights, 7 Oct 1777), Benedict Arnold — relieved of command — rode into the fight anyway and led the assault that broke the British line, taking a severe leg wound.

There is nowhere left for them to go. On October seventeenth, Burgoyne surrenders his whole army — near six thousand men — stacking their arms on the meadow by the Hudson. Their bands play as they march out. We line the road and watch a British army lay down its guns, and not a man of us jeers. We have seen what it cost.

On 17 October 1777, Burgoyne surrendered his entire army (~6,000 men) — the first surrender of a British army in the war.

The news crosses the ocean, and it changes everything. In Paris, old Doctor Franklin uses it to close the deal he has courted for months: France will come in — openly, with money, a navy, and an army. A rebellion the powers of Europe dismissed has just captured an entire royal army. Now the whole world is watching.

Word of Saratoga reached Paris and helped Benjamin Franklin secure the Franco-American alliance of February 1778, bringing France into the war openly.

We were farmers and hunters and shopkeepers, and in a stretch of New York woods we bagged a whole army and pulled an empire into the war on our side. They call it the turning point. Standing on Bemis Heights with the leaves coming down, we only knew we had won the biggest thing anyone had ever won.

Saratoga is remembered as the turning point of the Revolution — the victory that brought France in and set the course to independence. It turns 250 in 2027.