History and the Study Thereof

The Battle of Bunker Hill
by Howard Pyle

Whilst searching high and low, hither and yon for a topic with which to regale thee, my beloved readers, I thought that perhaps a taste of 18th Century warfare might be to your liking. So I went forth to find some suitable graphical image to lead the post.

'Twas then that I stumbled upon a favorite painting which I first saw as a callow youth, back in the last century as it were. That painting is shown above and purports to show the British Army marching up Bunker Hill, stolid and stoic, while the unseen patriots wait to see "the whites of their eyes" before opening fire.

Now before I go further, there's a few things which are, to me at any rate, worthy of note. Those things are:

1. There is a lot of smoke billowing up in the background. That smoke would necessarily be coming from Charlestown. Which the British had managed to set afire earlier that day.
2. There are quite a few British troops down on the ground, dead and wounded, both in the foreground and in the background, leading me to believe that this is not the first trip up the hill. I do recall the lobsterbacks (as we would term them in New England, back then and even now amongst the more well-read crowd) made three trips up the hill. And they got the you-know-what shot out of them the first two times. On the third trip, the "rebels" were nearly out of powder and shot. One ragged volley perhaps and then it was off to the races.
3. The British in the foreground are all grenadiers (based on their headgear) and from the looks of it, they are all clones of each other. That is, they all look too much alike. Uniformity from a military standpoint can be a good thing. But this? (Note the soldier whose face is turned towards us in the rear rank. It's almost as if he's just noticed that he doesn't really look like all the other guys!)

Now many of us, of a certain age, know that the Battle was not fought on Bunker Hill, rather it took place on Breed's Hill. Perhaps a map is in order (no, don't panic, I'm not going to write about the entire battle, I haven't done the requisite research to do that. If you want the quickie version, Wikipedia will do. That's here.)

Charlestown Neck

From Wikipedia:

On the night of June 16, colonial Colonel William Prescott led about 1,200 men onto the peninsula in order to set up positions from which artillery fire could be directed into Boston. This force was made up of men from the regiments of Prescott, Putnam (the unit was commanded by Thomas Knowlton), James Frye, and Ebenezer Bridge. At first, Putnam, Prescott, and their engineer, Captain Richard Gridley, disagreed as to where they should locate their defense. Some work was performed on Bunker Hill, but Breed's Hill was closer to Boston and viewed as being more defensible.

Now (after that overlong but hopefully educational tangent) where were we?

Ah yes, the painting by Mr Pyle. As I was saying, I first saw this painting when I was a kid. It remained stuck in my mind for many years whenever the Battle of Bunker Hill was mentioned. Only today did I really look at the painting again.

As you might guess, there are inaccuracies. Those lines are far too straight. It's hard keeping a line of troops that straight on a parade ground, let alone marching up a hill. (I know, I have done both, both in the ranks and bellowing out the commands. It's not easy!)

But while digging around in order to go into the painting in depth, I found this wondrous website, The Journal of the American Revolution (That link is their article regarding this very painting!)

So instead of posting about 18th Century warfare, I spent a lot of time reading their stuff. Poor you, lucky me, though as always, YMMV. At some point in time I do plan to write more about this topic. How the British marched in straight lines, wore red coats and we hid behind rocks and trees, etc. etc. Poppycock!

Most of us (of a certain age) learned in school about Baron von Steuben, the Prussian guy who taught the colonials about discipline and drill. Yup, he taught the Americans how to march in straight lines just like the British!

My point is that there is much that we Americans "mislearned" in school about the American Revolution. I aim to talk about that at some point in time. Just not today. You can read about it at those links above. As for me, I have the distinct displeasure of having to get ready for a colonoscopy tomorrow.

Lucky me!