Project sponsored by the Maryland Society of the Sons of the American Revolution
Recent posts: Finding the Maryland 400
Help Support the Maryland 400!
In August 1776, a group of soldiers—the Maryland 400—helped hold back the British Army at the Battle of Brooklyn, allowing the rest of the Americans to escape the field. The Marylanders lost a quarter of their men that day, but their stand saved the Continental Army, allowing it to live and fight another day. For […]
Revolutionary Book Review: George the Drummer Boy
The first book I ever read about the American Revolution was a children’s book called George the Drummer Boy, by Nathaniel Benchley, with illustrations by Don Bolognese. It tells the story of a drummer in the British Army who is stationed in Boston in 1775. His unit is chosen to march out of Boston to […]
A New Podcast Tells the Story of the Maryland Line
We are excited to share that a new podcast about the Revolutionary War, and Maryland’s soldiers, has been launched by Mission History. The series tells the story of the events that brought two armies, including nearly 2,000 soldiers from Maryland, to Camden, South Carolina in August 1781. The battle fought at Camden was one of […]
A Beating in Baltimore: Communal Violence during the Revolution
Today’s post comes from Marshall Cooperman of St. John’s College in Annapolis, who was part of the Maryland State Archives’ intern class of 2023. Marshall’s project team worked on cataloging a large collection of Revolutionary-era correspondence, and he came across the letters that tell this story while doing that work America in 1776 was a […]
Tag Archives: Continental Army
The British Come Ashore
On August 22nd, 1776, the British began setting the stage for battle by landing troops on Long Island. The Continental Army had been present in varying numbers on Long Island for nearly four months, since General Nathanael Greene was ordered … Continue reading
Biography of William McMillan, Maryland 400 Soldier
Earlier this summer, I wrote a post about a letter I had found in a pension file. The letter was a firsthand account of a Revolutionary War veteran’s experience in the war, written many years after the fact. The man … Continue reading
Maryland 400 Biographies Update
Hello All, We want to remind everyone about our Biographies page and say that we now have over eighty pages linked. Please feel free to take a look at what we have found and added to the database so far. … Continue reading
Alternative Sources: Clothing Records of the Maryland 400
While muster rolls and company returns would give the most accurate listing of the men in the Maryland 400, we have yet to come across one from the right time in the war. This has caused us to go to … Continue reading
The Dysfunctional Company
At the beginning of this project one of our first tasks was to establish which companies were actually present at the Battle of Brooklyn This reason for this is obvious enough: so that we do not waste too much time … Continue reading
Battle Maps of Long Island
Hello all, We recently came across some very interesting maps that show the events of the Battle of Long Island in good detail. As some of you may have noticed, one of these maps is now the background for the … Continue reading
Desertion: Scourge of the Army
Only disease could pose a greater danger to the cause of American Independence than that of desertion. No army in the 18th century, not even well trained professional ones, could escape the inevitability that many of the soldiers would leave … Continue reading
237 Years Ago
On July 6, 1776 the Convention of Maryland ordered Colonel William Smallwood to march his 6 Companies stationed in Annapolis and the 3 Companies in Baltimore to Philadelphia. Joining them would be three of the Independent Companies, specifically those under … Continue reading
Finding the Maryland 400 