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17541776 Club

Washington surrenders Fort Necessity; Coulon de Villiers avenges his brother at Jumonville

Rain-soaked powder and a meadow position with no cover leave the 22-year-old Virginia colonel no choice but to yield to the surrounding French force.

By the summer of 1754, a 22-year-old Virginia militia lieutenant colonel had already started a war he couldn't finish. Weeks after his men ambushed a French patrol at Jumonville Glen, George Washington fell back to a hastily built palisade in a meadow within the Laurel Highlands of the Allegheny Mountains. On July 3, 1754, French forces under Louis Coulon de Villiers, brother of the officer killed at Jumonville, surrounded Fort Necessity and forced Washington to surrender. Rain-soaked gunpowder and a poor position left him no real choice. It was the only time Washington personally surrendered a besieged force during his military career…

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More from July 3
1775

Washington rides into Cambridge; a crowd of farmers and tradesmen is now his army

Commissioned by Congress nine days ago, the new commander-in-chief finds his New England forces short on gunpowder, discipline, and uniforms.
1863

Lee turns south; 12,500 men sent across an open mile are thrown back, and the Army of Northern Virginia retreats

The assault on Cemetery Ridge collapsed under Union artillery and rifle fire before it reached the line; survivors streamed back across the same field.
1890

Harrison signs Idaho into the union; the 43rd state misses the Fourth by one day

Delegate Dubois had asked the President to wait and sign on July 4th; Harrison declined, ending twenty-seven years of territorial status a day early.
18141776 Club
Major Thomas Buck hands over the unfinished British post at the head of the Niagara River as Major General Jacob Brown pushes onto the frontier.
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More from Colonial America
1774

Delegates from twelve colonies gather at Carpenters' Hall; Georgia stays home

Peyton Randolph takes the chair as Philadelphia hosts the first colony-wide answer to Parliament's Intolerable Acts.
1620

The Mayflower clears Plymouth harbor, alone, bound for Virginia

The Speedwell has already been left behind as unseaworthy; 102 passengers now cross alone.
1775

Ethan Allen surrenders outside Montreal after his flanks bolt and his backup never comes

Ninety minutes of fire, and the man who took Fort Ticonderoga without a shot is a British prisoner.
1639

Coddington founds Newport; a new settlement opens on Aquidneck Island for those driven out by the Antinomian Controversy

The colony takes shape as Coddington plants a settlement built around the promise of religious freedom in Rhode Island.
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