Birth of the American Infantryman
Return of the Essays:
So, I am wrapping up my first Master’s term and last week I was away at a writing conference, so there have been a few missed posts. And today I sat down at the keyboard and said to myself; “I need a good post for Wednesday. Not all of my followers are into my Sunday posts or my gaming posts. But all of my writing posts have started to sound the same. Talking about second guessing, self-doubt, and world-building, over and over. I fear I shall bore my readers.”
The only answer is to delve into an Essay. I did have some thoughts about reviewing a book or movie, but I actually have many thoughts about reviews. They can be summed up in that I ONLY review things I like, and personally I hate snarky reviews that love to tear into things. These seem to be the rage these days. Ripping something apart.
Also, if I’m going to be very honest, my site isn’t a blockbuster of traffic. I would much rather place a review on Amazon or Goodreads, rather than here.
What is the Essay about…
One of my courses last year was on Colonial History of New England. I have a lovely essay about why Plymouth and the Pilgrims were specifically chosen as the foundation Myth for America. But that essay is very short, and after all of the short or skipped posts I felt that you deserved a more substantive post.
So, over the many paragraphs to follow you will be regaled with the story of the foundation of the American Infantry man. Specifically the contributions of one Robert Rogers and his Rangers.
Birth of the American Soldier.
The birth of the “American Fighting Man” predates the birth of the nation itself, created and reforged in the various colonial wars of the 17th and 18th century. It was the syncretism of European technologies and rules of warfare, with the skills of the Natives of New England, that would lead to this birth. This paper will show how the New England landscape and Native tribes had a profound affect on the “colonial” fighting man, and directly influenced how they became the “American” fighting man and even influenced us to revolution.
To understand the evolution of the American soldier one has to first understand where they came from and how they fought. In the 17th century the British model for the army was based off severe discipline and rote learning of tactics and rules of engagement. Officers were nominally drawn from the upper class and looked down on the basic soldier as “spineless, lazy oafs—‘the scum of the earth, enlisted for drink,’—to be flogged into minimal robotic performance by the most iron discipline.” [1] The level of discipline and punishment that the average soldier faced ranged from public humiliation, lashes, to even death at the hands of an officer. Journals of regular soldiers of the time show lots of boredom, broken with marching, short bursts of fighting, and lots of discipline reports.[2] These soldiers were primarily pulled from volunteer militias, and it wouldn’t be until almost the 18th century that the English Army started using professional soldiers. Massed musket fire, iron discipline, and the use of artillery where the main arms of the English Army. Most battles were about luring your enemy out into the open and destroying them with massed fire, even in the French and Indian war the main course of action was to find the best way to drag as much artillery as possible before a fort and knocking it down.[3]
But the colonists were not soldiers, they were Puritans and Separatists looking to found their own religious enclaves and start a basic life. But the colonies had their own issues, the Native tribes. Early American colonists began fighting the natives almost immediately, and though the settlers were militarily inept when compared to European professionals, survival in the colonies demanded that every settler develop soldiering skills.[4] Colonial troops, later to be called provincial troops were gathered from the local towns, they had no uniform, at least not during the 17th century, much later during the French and Indian war they would begin adopting uniforms based on their states of origin.[5] But that will be addressed later in the paper. While individual colonies had various levels of hostile and friendly interactions with the Natives, the first significant war is the Pequot War of 1637-8. The Pequots controlled an area from the Housatonic all the way to the Connecticut river, and even beyond toward the Rhode Island border. They were considered the greatest Native Military Power at the time, as they had the strength to keep the Narragansetts at bay and controlled a hegemony over the Mohegans, the Western Niantics, and the Connecticut River Valley peoples. And they had learned to face muskets by fighting with the Dutch in 1633.[6] Connecticut was the first colony to not only ally with the Natives living in their territory, but to do so with and equal distribution of labor. The Pequot War was the first to feature equal forces of English and Natives working in tandem, that achieved both military and political goals for both groups. This is the first step in the evolution of the fighting man. By fighting with native warriors and mimicking their “skulking style of warfare” the colonists realized that the European Block and open fields of fire where not suitable to the wilderness of New England. Though it would be more than a century before this interaction gave raise to the American elite, the Rangers. During the Pequot War, Connecticut’s successes occurred through a utilization of competent Native allies in large numbers at the start of the war and creating a military division of labor in which colonists and Indians performed duties associated with their respective strengths.[7] Allowing the Natives to work as scouts and sharpshooters and in a primary support role of the English who used their muskets and artillery to knock down Pequot forts.
With the ground work laid for mutual respect and interaction, we move into the Great Narragansett War, also called King Philip’s War, 1675-6. While the war was started by King Philip, or depending on your viewpoint was blamed on him, it was really dominated by the Narragansetts and other powers that Phillip had looked to for aid. Philip’s motives were not appealing to all the tribes he reached out to, the Mohegans, the surviving Pequots, and the Western Niantics where all allied with the Connecticut colony. In the Massachusetts Colony the Natick Praying Indians gave aid to the English, and the Eastern Niantic, under the leadership of Ninigret, remained neutral and stayed out of the fight. Considering their kinship to the Narragansett and powerful military this was a blessing.[8] The chaos of shifting alliances and the sudden uprising of many tribes that the colonists considered friendly—if inferior—neighbors was alarming and caught the colonists on the back foot. From these opening attacks though came alliances with the Natives who would see an end to Phillip and the Narragansett. These alliances with tribal allies, and the use of native warriors as scouts and sharpshooters, was the next step in the evolution of the Provincial Trooper. The colonists who had—and who continued to have strained relations with their Native neighbors—learned to respect their definition of war. The English had a belief that discipline and overcoming fear was the epitome of man hood in war. Standing in a block facing another block of enemy muskets and calmly loading your own rifle was literally beaten into Regular Troopers. While amongst the Natives the epitome of a warrior was measured in surviving a battle untouched and seeing how many men you could take prisoner. It was the highest level of skill to take live prisoners.[9] The Natives having few numbers didn’t like to take or even deliver massive casualties when they fought amongst themselves, though the level of their violence could, and often did, escalate. The English colonists had a similar population issue, this helped them overcome the English thoughts about manhood, and to adopt a more conservative version of warfare.[10] Striking from strength, creating battles where you have the advantage, hit and run tactics, and attrition through destroying supply lines and less defended positions; these were the tactics learned from fighting both with and against the Natives.[11] The Great Narragansett War closed out the 17th century, though there were four more great wars after, only the fourth was primarily fought America, The French and Indian War.
Europe saw the primary action during Williams War, Anne’s War, and George’s War; but America was the theater for the French and Indian War, which began in America two years before it was officially declared in Europe. By this time the colonists had spread across the length of New England and upstate New York, and where pushing deeper into the frontier with every passing year. Part of this expanding frontier had the effect of creating a breed of New Englander who by necessity had to be a jack-of-all-trades, a frontiers man who cut his home out of land far from the towns and cities of the Bay Colony and Southern New England. Part woodsman, part carpenter, part farmer, part whatever he needed to be to survive the wilderness. From this stock would come the last evolution of the soldier, before the revolution, the Ranger. But that’s putting the cart before the horse.
The start of the French and Indian War started with French Troops—at this time considered some of the best woodsmen and survivalists in the New World due to over a century of fur trading and hunting across Canada—Canadian Militia, and Huron and Ottawa Indian tribal warriors. Early battles started in Nova Scotia and Maine, but eventually the French stabbed into upstate New York seizing Lake Champlain and threatening the Hudson River corridor. The Colonists needed to mobilize. England sent over a force of British Regulars, the well known Red Coats, but first they needed someone to hold the territory as they sailed for America. As such a provincial army was raised in the Bay Colony and sent to the front. There is an interesting level of paradox that is created by these provincial troops. Due to shrewd political maneuvering and negotiating Governor John Shirley got the British to pay the bill for the provincial troops. The paradox is that during the early war the disparity of gear and utter lack of uniforms between provincials and redcoats was marked, and yet the provincials were paid higher.[12] Until the late 1750s provincial troops had no uniforms, fighting in whatever clothes they left home with. Later on, some of the states would introduce some form of uniformity, like the New Jersey Blue Coats, who wore blue coats. Washington’s First Riflemen wore rifle shirts, native breechclouts, and thigh high leggings.[13] But all of these would be near the end of the war. When the redcoats arrived in America their only concession to the nature of the battlefield was to lighten their normal load of gear. Swords were taken off belts, sergeants left behind their halberds, and a slightly lighter—10 pound—musket was brought to the field. All soldiers were issued enough shot and powder to fire usually around 40-60 shots, and they all had bayonets.[14] Conversely the provincials had no bayonets and usually carried lighter, smaller caliber fowling pieces. Smoothbore weapons that were so old and broken down that sometimes the flintlock and pan were held on with rope. Some of these weapons were hand me downs over a century old. The British still used the tactical handbook that had always brought them out in wars in Europe. Unaccustomed to the landscape or the Native practices that the New Englanders had dealt with for over a century the redcoats didn’t do well in the early days of the war. When it came to open fields, moving troops, and knocking down forts they knew their muster, but when it came to scouting or defending against French raiders they failed time and again. The English Effort was to keep pushing and taking French camps, forts and materiel; while the provincials were used as a reserve force and used for digging trenches and hauling cannons, and other such work. This work was still deadly and placed them in harm’s way, but the English were determined to win the war using their own troops.[15]
This misuse of the provincial troops can be somewhat blamed on Governor Shirley. While Shirley was responsible for running the war in the early years, he was also instrumental in making the British Crown pay for the war, and also for securing his position in in Colonial politics—and some people believed that some of the money also went into his own pockets. As much as Shirley was a British aristocrat he was also an “American”, he understood colonial politics and the mindset/ culture of New England. He understood that the provincials were a pious lot, that most of the men volunteered to limited terms of service due to a sense of duty and to help the whole of the community. The colonies had spent over a hundred and fifty years basically fending for themselves and the didn’t exactly recognize the British Crown as the ultimate authority. They barely even thought of themselves as British citizens at this point. This is revealed in letters and journals of Lord Loudoun, who was sent to take over the war effort from Shirley. When Loudoun arrived and saw the state provincial troops across upstate New York and he read through reports from Shirley and Winslow, he was certain that malfeasance was at work and that Shirley had deliberately created failure points. Confronted with troops who had clear end-dates to their terms of service, had poor supplies, and who only served based on contracts, Loudoun just couldn’t get his head around such things. To him troops served as they were told, British citizens only had the rights that their masters allowed them.[16] Loudoun had to start off his war efforts on the back foot, due to Shirley’s maneuvers he was forced to make concessions to the Provincials and to also create a new system for supplying the front, Shirley professed innocents from wrong doing and tried to explain the provincial troopers viewpoint “That their operative nature between themselves and the province that he understood to be his employer. Although he was fighting on the King’s behalf, he did not regard himself as an employee of the king.” This was completely alien to Loudoun; “an army of men who assumed soldiers’ rights and the conditions of their enlistment
[and]
who behaved as if they were actually the equals of their leaders.”[17] In these examples one can see the basis for American ideals, that all men are equal and that we have inalienable rights. The men who fought in this war would also fight and lead in the revolution and many of them would become our founding fathers. Shirley was a British noble, but he was also an American in spirit, he understood who the New Englanders thought and how they wanted to be treated.
But tactics need to change and grow. The use of the longbow back in the 100 Years War was the first step in returning the infantry to dominance of the battlefield.[18] The arrows of the bowmen destroyed the mounted knight and the mobility of the archers allowed them to control the field of battle. While the English are often seen as stubborn in their ways, and in the manner of their warfare, they could still understand this lesson. To wit, in 1739 they created their first dedicated light infantry unit, the 42nd Royal Highlanders.[19] Realizing that they needed better scouts and a change in tactics they employed local hunters and frontiers men, men like Robert Rogers, who was New Hampshire born man who had been raised in an area frequented by Mohawk traders and bordered on Abenaki lands. From his time spent among the natives he learned to read the landscape and deeply observe his surroundings at all times. These observations taught him not only good hunting practices but also to think tactically about warfare. He could scan a tree line and spot the best path to hide his men, he knew the best spot to create an ambush, and see the sign of someone who passed through.[20] Rogers would start his career as a teenager, working as a member of a scouting party for his town, later when he was in his twenties and the French and Indian War started he found 30 liked minded men and walked them over to enlist them in the militia. He received a signing bonus and a commission.
The word ranger first showed up in writing in 13th century England, it was applied as a ‘far-traveling forester or borderer.’ By the late 16th century they existed as irregular units that patrolled the lands between England and Scotland.[21] And while they existed in the colonies as singular individuals during the previous wars; the Pequot War and the Great Narragansett War. It was Rogers who would codify them, forge them into an elite unit, and later on write his Rules of Ranging. A book which would have a debatable effect to the present day. On March 23rd, 1756, Rogers arrived in Boston to answer a summons from Governor Shirley. Shirley was about to be replaced as the commander of the American War Effort and was using his Lame Duck time to effect as much good as possible. Rogers was tasked with creating an “independent company of rangers”, they would not count as provincials as they would be paid by the Crown, but at the same time they would be independent irregular troops. Though still held to the British Articles of War and subject to military discipline.[22] Rogers was tasked with, to use his own words, “From time to time, to use my best endeavours to distress the French and their allies, by sacking, burning; and destroying their houses, barns, barracks, canoes, bateaux, &c., and by killing their cattle of every kind; and at all times to endeavour to waylay, attack, and destroy their convoys of provisions by land and water, in any part of the country where I could find them.”[23] That is what he did, make life hell for the soldiers stuck in their forts during the winter months. Most soldiers hunkered down for the winter, the war was on pause, but not the rangers. They were more active in the winter. They used snowshoes to cover vast distances, covered their bodies in bear fat and wore multiple layers of clothing to control their body temperature and reduce sweating. They used terror tactics and scalped any French men they killed. They even ice skated for miles across a lake to take a supply convoy by surprise. Rogers honed his troops into a fighting elite, each trooper was outfitted to be a self-sufficient unit. They carried everything they needed to survive in the wilderness; from leather tools and hanks of threads used to repair clothes, moccasins, and snowshoes. To tomahawks and long knives for in close fighting and, again, survival tools. Their muskets had been cut down from 46 inches to 38, and every man carried 60 shot, a five-pound bag around his waist.[24] He also required that all of his men memorize his 28 standing orders. And here is where we come to the core of why Rogers is often called the father of the modern rangers.
His rules, his adaptation of the teachings of the various tribes and rangers who taught him, distilled down into a simple list of orders. These rules were in complete opposition to the European warfare of the time, which insisted on submission to authority and maintaining central control at all times. This was backed up by the use of corporal punishment using floggings and beatings, even death. Rogers, by contrast, followed Native ways of retaining flexible tactics and options at all times, coupled with a desire to keep the troops motivated by respecting and encouraging their individual initiative. He had rules such as traveling in single file to hide numbers, keeping short distances between troops, never take the same path back, and orders to disperse as individuals and make your way back to a pre-determined rendezvous point. These are all similar to modern tactics and Rogers teachings are the cornerstone of for all American and British infantry tactics today.[25]
Bringing it all together, the very landscape of New England
could not be denied in its roll of changing the colonists. After all it had
created the Native tribes as well, it nurtured and raised them and allowed them
to thrive. Massive trees, abundant resources, and everything that kept the
Natives alive and also attracted the colonists in the first place. Europe had
long ago been tamed and cut through with roads and cleared of most of its
forests. But New England still had a touch of the primordial in it, and it
refused to bow to the English notion of how wars needed to be fought. The
colonists learned to adapt to New England, they still pushed their beliefs and
brought their way of life with them, but they had to adapt and overcome. When
they did this, they also thrived, and the colonies spread. Conflict was
inevitable but all sides learned from contact with one another and slowly the
way of life and the values of the colonies changed. In the beginning of the
French and Indian War, William Shirley wanted to make a lot of money for the
Bay Colony and secure his political power. It was a money grab and about power,
not about fighting the French.[26]
Eventually his schemes caught up with him, but before he went he made sure that
he made a difference, and he also made sure that it was colonists who won the
war and not just redcoats come over the ocean. Some last gasp of nationalism
perhaps, a sudden feeling for America as something over than a colony? We don’t
know, but he helped form Roger’s Rangers. The rangers helped create an elite,
wholly American unit, made up of colonists and Natives, who were equals on the
battlefield. The rangers had Natives who carried rank and title. Winning the
war with these men created a sense of national pride, coupled with the
political maneuvering started by Shirley and ended with Pitt, the colonies
started to get a sense of self, of an identity that was more than a British
Province. In 1755 with Shirley maneuvering to have supreme command over the
American theater of war you can just see the gears starting to click toward the
revolution. The strength to want independence was taught to us by the very land
that demanded we learn to adapt and change to it, and it promised that it would
protect and raise us in turn. The very Natives we fought and conquered, whom we
stole from and removed to less desirable lands, had a hand in teaching us the
ways to enjoy these lands. They had a hand in giving us an identity that was
not English but was American. The rangers were the first elite American special
forces, and the foundation for the riflemen to follow, and the US Army after
that.
Bibliography
Anderson, Fred. A People’s Army: Massachusetts Soldiers & Society in the Seven Years War. University of North Carolina Press. Williamsburg, Virginia. 1984
Carroll, Al. “They Kill Indians Mostly, Don’t They?”: Rogers’ Rangers and the Adoption of Indian Tactics.” In Medicine Bags and Dog Tags: American Indian Veterans from Colonial Times to the Second Iraq War, 37-47. Lincoln; London: University of Nebraska Press, 2008. doi:10.2307/j.ctt1dfnv0s.6.
Cochrane-Rogers, Mary. A Battle Fought on Snow Shoes: Roger’s Rock, Lake George; March 13, 1758. Published by the Author, Derry, NH. 1917. Project Gutenberg.
Fenn, Elizabeth A. “Biological Warfare in Eighteenth-Century North America: Beyond Jeffery Amherst.” The Journal of American History 86, no. 4 (2000): 1552-580. doi:10.2307/2567577.
Hamilton, Edward Pierce. “Colonial Warfare in North America.” Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society 80 (1968): 3-15. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.snhu.edu/stable/25080653.
Lee, Wayne E. “Peace Chiefs and Blood Revenge: Patterns of Restraint in Native American Warfare, 1500-1800.” The Journal of Military History 71, no. 3 (2007): 701-41. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.snhu.edu/stable/30052888.
Owen, Jack E. “The Influence of Warfare in Colonial America: On the Development of British Light Infantry.” Army History, no. 44 (1998): 20-30. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.snhu.edu/stable/26304816.
Parmenter, Jon. “After the Mourning Wars: The Iroquois as Allies in Colonial North American Campaigns, 1676-1760.” The William and Mary Quarterly, Third Series, 64, no. 1 (2007): 39-76. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.snhu.edu/stable/4491596.
Rogers, Roberts. Journals of Robert Rogers of the Rangers: Fighting with the Rangers During the French and Indian War. Edited by Franklin B Hough, original edition published by Rogers, London. This edition 2016.
Ross, John F. War on the Run: The Epic Story of Robert Rogers and the Conquest of America’s First Frontier. New York. Bantam Books, 2009. This edition 2011.
Tomlinson, Abraham. The Military Journals of Two Private Soldiers, 1758-1775. Poughkeepsie, NY. Published by the Author, at the Museum, 1855. Project Gutenberg.
Warren, Jason. Connecticut Unscathed: Victory in the Great Narragansett War 1675-1676. Norman, OK. University of Oklahoma Press. 1977
Weidensaul, Scott. The
First Frontier: The Forgotten History of Struggle, Savagery, & Endurance in
Early America. Boston. Houghton, Miffin, Harcourt. 2012.
[1] John F Ross, War on the Run, paraphrased from page 2.
[2] Abraham Tomlinson, this is an online journal, as such no page numbers, but running through first journal of Lemuel Lyon, there are numerous instances of men being lashed. In one entry 6th of October, has two men lashed 100 times each, and a local woman who was switched on her behind 50 and 2 lashes. Fornications rules?
[3] Edward Pierce Hamilton, “Colonial Warfare in North America.” Mass historical society.
[4] Jack E. Owen, Army History, No 44 (1998) page 21
[5] Edward Pierce Hamilton, “Colonial Warfare in North America.” Mass historical society, page 15
[6] Jason Warren, Connecticut Unscathed, page 20
[7] Ibid, page 13
[8] Ibid, page 40
[9] Jack E. Owens. Army History, No 44 (1998) page 21-2 and Various points in Fred Anderson, Military discipline and punishments for breaking ranks. Pages 111-141.
[10] Wayne E. Lee, Journal of Military History, 71 no. 3 (2007), paraphrased.
[11] Jack E. Owens, Army History, No 44 (1998) page 20-2
[12] Ross, War on the Run, page 113, a ranger made double the pay of a private, and a private in the provincial army made more than a private in the Red Coats. Provincial Officers drew the same payrate as their English counterparts.
[13] Edward P. Hamilton, “Colonial Warfare in North America,” page 14-15
[14] Ibid.
[15] Fred Anderson, A People’s Army, page 142-3
[16] Fred Anderson, A People’s Army, pages 51-53
[17] Ibid, paraphrased from multiple lines page 178-9
[18] Jack E. Owen, Army History no. 44 (1998), page 20
[19] Ibid pg 21
[20] John F. Ross, War on the Run, page 30 Also in Rogers journals.
[21] Ibid page 43-4
[22] This is a combination of Ross pages 111-14, and also using Rogers’ own journal which breaks down the pay rates for his men by rank.
[23] Roger’s Journal page 27-8
[24] John F Ross, War on the Run, page 146
[25] Al Carroll, “They Kill Indians Mostly, Don’t They?” Medicine Bags and Dog-tags, page 39
[26] Fred Anderson, A People’s Army, page 8
