American Battle Tactics Help Achieve Victory in Revolutionary War

During the Revolutionary War, the Americans often engaged the British through unconventional warfare, also known as the Fabian strategy.

This strategy involves hit-and-run tactics favored by Continental Army Gen. George Washington, as well as other Army and state militia commanders. 

In this approach, instead of initiating frontal assaults in open fields, soldiers hide behind trees, rocks or structures. They then shot into formations of redcoats before quickly withdrawing into the forest. 

These tactics wore the British down through heavy casualties and lower morale — American casualties were minimized. 

The strategy is named after the Roman army Gen. Quintus Fabius Maximus Verrucosus, who used it against Carthage during the Second Punic War, from 218 to 201 B.C.

The American and British soldiers also employed frontal assaults, such as in the Battle of Bunker Hill and the Battle of Long Island. In these pitched battles, soldiers lined up in formations and fired their muskets at each other from about 80 to 100 feet away, getting three or four shots per minute.

As the formations drew closer and with no time to reload their muskets, fighting shifted to bayonets, swords and pikes. 

In addition to these tactics, both sides sent light infantry forward to engage the enemy before the bulk of their forces arrived. They were also used as scouts to determine the enemy’s size and location. 

Another key tactic was the siege, which Washington employed at Yorktown, Virginia. The Americans dug trenches, which they used to safely move artillery pieces close to the British, who were surrounded by the Americans on land and by French warships in the Chesapeake Bay.

At sea, tactics aboard warships were different. Ships would pummel each other with cannonballs, hotshot or scattershot, with the goal of sinking the other ship, felling the ship’s masts, setting it ablaze and killing sailors.  

Then, as in land combat, close-quarters fighting erupted: as the two ships drew abreast, sailors would jump onto the opposing vessel, killing their enemy with pistols, knives, swords and pikes. 

Meanwhile, reflecting another layer of strategy, Continental Marine sharpshooters took positions on platforms on the mainmast, firing their muskets down at sailors on the other ship.