The war opened in the summer of 1775, by skirmishes between the British troops and armed provincials, for the possession of certain magazines. At the beginning there seemed no hope of the contest being protracted beyond one campaign. The population of the colonies was at this time under three millions, and they were greatly inferior in discipline and appointments to the British troops. They possessed, however, an indomitable zeal in the cause they had agreed to defend, and fought with the advantage of being in the country of their friends. At Bunker’s Hill, near Boston (June 17, 1775), they had the superiority in a well-contested fight with the British troops, of whom between two and three hundred were killed. At the end of one year, the British government was surprised to find that no progress had been made towards a reduction of the Americans, and sent out an offer of pardon to the colonists, on condition that they would lay down their arms. This proposal only met with ridicule.
On the 4th of July 1776, the American Congress took the decisive step of a declaration of their independence, embodying their sentiment in a document remarkable for its pathos and solemnity. During the next two campaigns, the slender forces of the new republic were hardly able anywhere to face the large and well-appointed armies of Great Britain. Much misery was endured by this hardy people in resisting the British arms. Notwithstanding every disadvantage and many defeats, America remained unsubdued.
The first serious alarm for the success of the contest in America, was communicated in December 1777, by intelligence of the surrender of an army under General Burgoyne at Saratoga. In the House of Commons, the ministers acknowledged this defeat with marks of deep dejection, but still professed to entertain sanguine hopes from the vigor with which the large towns throughout Britain were now raising men at their own expense for the service of the government. Mr. Fox, the leader of the Opposition, made a motion for the discontinuance of the war, which was lost by 165 to 259, a much narrower majority than any which the ministry had before reckoned in the Lower House.
In proportion to the dejection of the government, was the elation of the American Congress. Little more than two years before, the British sovereign and ministers had treated the petitions of the colonists with silent contempt; but such had been the current of events, that, in 1778, they found it necessary, in order to appease the popular discontent, to send out commissioners, almost for the purpose of begging a peace. As if to avenge themselves for the indignities of 1775, the Americans received these commissioners with the like haughtiness; and being convinced that they could secure their independence, would listen to no proposals in which the acknowledgment of that independence, and the withdrawal of the British troops, did not occupy the first place. The ministers, unwilling to submit to such terms, resolved to prosecute the war, holding forth to the public, as the best defense of their conduct, the necessity of curbing the spirit of insubordination, both in the American colonies and at home, which they described as threatening the overturn of the most sacred of the national institutions.