What's she gonna do? Brother? When Jeff Townsend Media runs wild on you America Stories. Alright, alright, alright, this is Jeff Townsend joining me or Luke and Jack for another episode of America Stories. Guys, I appreciate you joining on me for another one. The last episode was pretty fun that we did. Guys. Yeah, they're taking a fort tychon drogo yep with no pants on. So yeah, I took a lot away from that episode. It was. It was the major point. Yeah, yeah. And the propaganda artwork I've continued to check out since then. So a lot of propaganda back then it seemed like, yeah, good stuff. How do you think the propagandas changed from then to now? Like then you just had to like write a book from charlsontime you had to go to the paper and convince them to write a smear piece and stuff or just flat up write a slam book against someone. It was, yeah, a lot more work. Even the drawings back then, we're neat. They're definitely all loaded though they're definitely sided on some side, but they is. It's pretty cool to look at that, and that was a fun episode. So I'm excited to get the showback on the road here and see what you guys have in store for this week as we continue to go along the journey of the Revolutionary War. Where we talked about the capture of the Fort last week, So we're really only a couple of weeks into the wars for the timeline goes I believe, Yes, yeah, the capture of the Fort was like a mere three weeks I believe, after the battle Election and Concord, and then this is we're talking about today, is the Battle of Bunker Hill, which took place just a few weeks after that. Isn't then that takes place on fall Out four two. It is, in fact, if you google Battle of Bunker Hill, follow Out four pops up before h Revolutionary War. If you don't, oh complete, I thought I remember being a mission on there, Like I know, it's pretty certain. Yeah it was. It a full deal, was DLC Or is it just like in the base game? I don't know, great game though, it is. So what's so before we jump into what we're talking about today, that game actually does incorporate a lot of these things we're talking about. Yea, Then we will talk about we have talked about, like the theme of the Revolutionary War is very strong in that game. It is, in fact, there's the Minutemen are in that game. Yeah yea, so yep, Well, so what what do we have on the radar? We all do we have on we said, Bunker Hill? So yeah, Bunker Hill. So in June of seventeen seventy five, towards the beginning of it, the colonial militia had surrounded Boston. They had fifteen thousand troops surrounding the city, but they couldn't starve out the British because they didn't have the port. The British had the port. They had the largest navy in the world, and obviously so they had to think on lockdown they can bring in as much food or supplies they wanted to keep bringing it in, keep shipping it in. Yeah, And so it came down to like they knew they needed to get some guns surrounding the city if they wanted to ever attack. So they had long range cannons and stuff like that, which a lot of those were just seized from Fort Ticonderoga. So they were hoping to get them down to Boston so that they can then bombard the ships and assault the city. How much longer was this exactly afterwards? Sorry if you said it, I apologized. Oh, it was just a couple of weeks. It was because they are They started like surrounding it at the start of June. So yeah, it was just a couple of weeks later that they were had Boston under siege, but they had a party and they immediately using these supplies. They hadn't got them yet. Unfortunately, they're still long ways off traveling across country with cannons, much slower than how fast people will go on their own. In fact, Thomas Gage, the general and Boston knew that they didn't have the guns yet but would soon, and so he realized he needed to clear the colonials off the nearby hills overlooking the harbor, and that was Bunker Hill in Breed's Hill, because he knew that once they got those cannons there, they could shell the boats, take out the harbor, and then they could swarm in. So I guess before we dive into this too much, let's get let's get back to the what's the talk going on, what's the thought process? How confident are we we as in America the colonies? How how confident are we and what's about to transpire. I know, this is kind of like a weird situation where it wasn't I guess it seemed like this attack was like often delayed, but we kind of it was kind of provoked. It's like, what was our strategy coming in to this? So at this point, a large portion we're hoping to simply get a settlement with the British, Like if they take out like something like Boston, then they were taking well, you know, this war will end because they want they'll come to negotiations. Well, in fact, that seem like they were swinging for a home run like this is big, yeah, knockout blow in the beginning of the first round of the fight, right and at that point, you know, then dog come to the table with you and we talk it out, you know. And so that was their hope, and they figured, well, we have the men here now. The British Army doesn't have a ton of minute in Boston. All we are afraid of right now are the guns on those ships. So too, they kind of were pretty feeling pretty good about this and they just needed to hold the line for a few more days, wait for the guns to get there, and then take Boston. It was at this point though, that Thomas Gage in Boston spoke to his generals and they decided, his generals being William Howe and Henry Clinton, they decided that they should attack the Colonials first. Don't let them set up those guns and take out those hills. So they knew, they knew what was going on. It's amazing. It's amazing to me that I guess you could call it scout work. Yeah, they knew that those guns were coming, they knew that those hills were going to be fortified, and because that made the most strategic sense to fire on the harbor. So Alan Clinton decided they would marshall forces to go across the harbor and attack the hills, Breed's Hill being slightly closer. They were going to attack Breed's Hill first. Once they decided on this plane of action, there was a spy in Thomas Gage's circle. No one knows who actually, to this day, I don't believe there's been a single person affair who would found this out. Was somebody tipped off the Colonials that the British we're going to attack the next day or yeah, the next day. My my bet is on someone named John Brown. How many more Don Browns cul come across? If you guys, I've incorporated John Brown today, I ship my pants. This is I don't know how that was the best I could come up with. Tis done? There might be another John Brown, they seems like. Uh so. The major general in charge of the colonial army on on the hill was a man named Israel Putnam and his uh second command with a colonel named WILLIAMS. Prescott. They decided that they were going to prepare for battle the next day as fast as they could. Prescott had fifteen hundred men under him. That bill j an earthen fort on top of that hill that night. That fort was six feet tall of dirt one hundred and fifty feet long. They did it all on one night, and dug a bunch of holes and trenches in front of this hill to slow of the advance. And then he went out and took a steak one hundred feet away from the top of the hill, stuck it in the ground, and told them that if anyone passed that stake, to shoot them. This was a site that the British actually were not expecting the next morning. They did not believe that anyone could build a fort that fast, with such a large amount of it that it was, it was definitely not something that they had planned on. They said that they knew that this was going to be now a costly fight as instead of just rolling over the Colonials. Was there any concern at all from the British slide at this point in time as about the difficulty of this battle overall or just the war overall or the battle, like what what were they thinking? Oh, they were definitely very concerned. Yeah, they knew that this was this was a make or break moment for either side as but the British were way out numbered inside of Boston they so they knew that if they were to fail here, the Colonials would overrun them. So yeah, this they knew this was a very very tough situation. So the next morning, this was June seventeenth, seventeen seventy five, they saw the fort for the first time and they knew they still had to assault it no matter what. But what they tried to do was simply blasted from the harbor with their boats and coastal brideries. But they were firing uphill and at two four wasn't from the harbor it was I don't know the exact distance, but it was a pretty decent amount. It was so far that their cannons on their boats couldn't make it, but they had a psychological effect and caused some of the clonal militia to actually flee. A good portion of them actually fled at this point, just to turn the cannons go off and just yeah, and seeing all the troops massing at the water's edge, that's when General Howe commanded a march to take the hill. Prescott knew that they also had a very small amount of bullets, and he said they had to make every bullet count. And he said that now famous phrase, don't shoot until you see the whites of their eyes. He said. Basically, they wanted them to be as close as you can do is you have to be able to see their eyes before you fire. That way they don't miss. This seems like a very u like just a roll of the dice attempt here. It's like it's going all in so early and you're not obviously the preparation, weaponry wise in and strategically it's just not there. Yeah. Actually, I wanted to point out back to the when they were prepping the fort with the with the stakes in the ground. It kind of reminds me of like old you know, maybe like archery range finding to some degree, where they would defend forts with very similar tactic, but they get determined how far things are out, and they would put the stakes out a certain number of paces away from the castle walls. So I wonder, you know, if I was kind of going through his head, was yelled those kind of like old ways of defending fortifications. But again, though, it's like we're gonna pull off, We're gonna do this overnight. It seems like that seems to be a common I guess you, I don't know much. I don't know how like beneficial it is to get too far ahead of it, but it seems like, hey, we're gonna try to pull off this miracle overnight. Again. Yeah, I was feeling they kept doing it over and over again. And actually it's kind of interesting to see up until this point that the British probably almost didn't one hundred percent still take it und like this is not like a real army. We're fighting here, and like we're we've got to advance, we got to take this thing. They were they took the combat seriously, but it seemed like they were specifically the colonial militia. Uh, this isn't like a enemy force that we're really dealing diplomatically. They weren't terrified, right we In Boston, Thomas Gage could see the new earthworks on the hill with a spyglass and he so he was watching it from within the city and he turned to one of his staff. It was a loyalist, you know, American who was actually Colonel Prescott's brother in law, the one on top of the hill. He turned to him and says, will he fight? And uh, he said of his men, I don't know, but Prescott will fight you all the way to the gates of Hell. It's a kind of guy you one on your side. Yeah, he knew his brother in law was going to fight back, and he was gonna do everything he could to hold the British off. So is this spyglass thing like the early modern like binoculars that you always see like, yeah, well you see like the guy on the pirate boat or whatever, and like pictures like all of those things made of Anyway, I always wondered that, you know, I guess it's almost like a telescope. Maybe I actually want to get those spyglass real bad because I do want to know like how is the lens work inside there and everything. But but yeah, it was basically like that kind of like you know, yeah, should it up and you could pull it out? Yeah, yeah, I know what you're talking about. Yeah, And so you know, this is this is interesting because like you know, Broston is you know, on one side of this harbor, on the other side over the hills, but there's also a town there, Charleston is right there. So there are two towns within, like you know, spitting distance of each because you can see through a spy glass you can see atop of this hill, and Charleston is directly next to this hill. And this actually plays into a probably the British face almost immediately because unknown to them in Charlestown, there are some long rifle hunters out there. These men were bird hunters, and they were specialized in shooting birds at midflight, and they were up in the church towers and other high buildings and could actually shoot and kill the British way further out than the people on top of the hill could, and they were aiming for their officers. So how ordered the burning of Charleston. He got the boats to swing about, to start blasting with their cannons and to ignite the town. How successful was it. It was stop the snipers because it killed a lot of them, but also there was smoke a fire, and the smoke sorry billing up. He hoped that the smoke would blow towards the hill, but the wind kicked up in a weird way and it blew it behind it, and everyone described it as this almost like haunting backdrop, the little color of the smoke he gets the sky and everything had a bizarre effect that they were marching towards. So there were fifteen hundred men on a hill and the British had three thousand veterans, British grenadiers. They're some of their best soldiers marching up it, and they make their first march up the hill and you know, this is one of those things that like they did back then, and it doesn't make sense now, why march over open ground, up a hill towards people with firearms. And obviously what happened was a volley of musket fire that the scene was described as if a scythe cut through wheat in a field just immediately a hundred or more men fall to the ground bleeding out. Were they just not like expecting for the for the militia to fight that way? I believe that it was something of as where I'm looking for a cocky attitude that seeing their red coats and their you know gear coming at you, that you would be afraid and you would burn away. Because that is part of how the British Army won, and that's why they wore their distinctive outfits, is because you knew you were fighting a professional army and that a lot of people would just run off, especially uh not regulars. These are militia right as so these are farmers and they must have just as farmers with nothing to lose. But they didn't take into account that these people had nothing to go back to. You know, this was their thing they wanted to fight for, and so they didn't break, they didn't run away, and they killed a lot of British in that first wave. They they had to bridge regrouped, they ran back, uh you know, their officers tried to regain control. A bunch of officers were killed in that first volley, of like junior officers and that was the actual was. One of the major costs of this battle for the British is how many officers they lose, because you're not really supposed to kill the officers, right, No, Yeah, in fact, it's it's uh considered bad form to kill an officer in battle. You're supposed to kill the soldier. This is uh kind of like going back to that what we're talking about the drawings of Techno Roga. There's also several portions obviously of Bunker Hill, and they kind of shows and the like a depiction of what has been described as far as it's just like hill just completely covered in this like smoky backdrop and then just like rows and ranks of file of redcoats charging up hills and and just you know, being shot from from a top of the hill. And so you can kind of like just look through any of the Bunker Hill drawings and kind of see, you know, exactly what you can imagine from that. From that battle, the British tried again to march up the hill. They marched over their dead and wounded double pace to try to get up there faster this time, assuming that at a rapid rate they might get up there and spook them. They're still effectively trying the same tactic, scaring the militia, getting them to break. It didn't work. They were shot again, slaughtered in a large amount. By this point they had lost over five hundred men at least they are dying and bleeding out on this ground. But we're also running out of bullets, right, I mean, we're we don't have that much ammunition to support a long term battle here. And actually, at this point, how did not know how few bullets the colonials had. He was still believing they may possibly have as many bullets as he has, and so as far as he knows, they have like, you know, enough to win the whole day. But he does realize at this point that this is the last shot they have. They have to take this hill now or Boston will be lost, and that means, you know, likely he'll be executed, Gage will be executed and the British Army is going to lose. Which as a British officer of high rank, very proud man, he did not want the British Army to besmirched. He definitely didn't want to be with his name tied to it. But he didn't realize that the Colonials had used most of their powder and shot, so he was effectively sending his men up there to die. He knew that was a strong possibility, but this time he had them take off all their packs, all their canteens, and all their powder horns, and had them put their bayonets on. And he was just going to have them charge up with just the bayonets and tried to kill everyone in a melee. Because of that, they were able to run up the hill at a breakneck speed, and by the time they got up over the hill, the last the Colonial bullets had been fired and it was an absolute slaughter. They immediately broke over the top of that earthen works and butchered them with bayonets. At this point, the Colonials had no choice. They had to retreat or lose everyone. They don't they don't have like band, They didn't really have the hands on hand melee. The Colonials actually had no bayonets at all. Wow, so they were not prepared for a melee. They weren't prepared for up a close combat like that. And by the end of it, the British do when they over random at Breed's Hill and the cost of it was a thousand British soldiers and all of How's command staff. Yeah, it was a lot, a lot of people. The Colonials lost four hundred men by the end of it. This was all, oh, victory, but not a great victory. They've forced the Colonials off the top of that hill. But now they've lost so much material, they've lost ben and they've lost experienced officers. So this war, which wasn't going great for either side, still isn't. But we went the Colonials on the retreat. The British can't do anything, they can't pursue and they can't finish it off. So it's like so it's like a win for the for America in a sense that it proved again I guess again that we're able to battle with these guys. We have defense, but literally they have to retreat because they just can't fight. But in some sense it's like a spirited victory. I guess, yeah, it's it's it's called a pirate victory and military circumstances, it was a victory for the Britain in the in the sense they got what they wanted, but the cost was so great that they weren't going to win anything more. Yeah, and uh this led though to the unfortunate end of any chance of diplomacy. The very next moment the king had heard about all this, he declared every person in the colonial militia traders, there would be no negotiations. They would all be treated the same, and so everyone was going to hang together. And you know, it's actually kind of interesting to think that this was like like this is like the first real the first real battle, right, because there's been like there's been some skirmish systems and fights, there's like, uh, you know, the protests of that kind of escalated into something bigger. But and then tech Hono Roga was there was no there was no killing of Techno Roga. And but this was like a full on one military against another. And so this was like when you I think both sides probably fully realized that this was not just some protest or something that we're just trying to get point across. This is like this is officially a war, you know, like it's like the war has had already been gone, but this is like the first real, real battle here. And there was a lot of a lot of people died in that in that first battle, there I love when I read some interesting facts about this. They always have like a I'm reading on this website always have like a missing section, like people go missing, and make sure you wonder at this point in time, because like you're here in America, right. I guess you could just run home. I mean, Reddish honestly can't do that. But I do wonder that if the missing is really just people who did ron coming, you know, you could see that you could see someone who was like, you know, I don't know what if I actually want to do this. They might have ran off or or or it could be the same where they died and they just didn't They couldn't figure out who was who I remember, I remember the name, but I remember something else about this because there was some sight seers of this event. People were actually watching this event, right, yes, because I mean something you wouldn't see every day, a battle in your backyard basically, you know, Yeah, there was a president that watched that. I leave, h I am trying to remember who who actually saw. It's hard. I can't remember, but one of them did or all lived in the area. I got it here. I'll break this part down, Yeah, cut out the battle here and Boston, a neighboring communities. Curious colonialist climbed roofs, steeples and hills to watch the battle unfold ten miles south of Bunker Ten miles south of Bunker Hill, seven year old John Quincy Adams stood next to his mother Abigail, atop a hill near his childhood home and heard the thunder claps of cannon fire and watched the smoke rise from the battlefield. Yeah. Yeah, so that so there's actually like people were watching this. I mean the future presidents were watching this. Yeah, that's it was intense. Afterwards, Benjamin Franklin wrote a letter to a friend he had in England the names escaping me. But he said that after the Battle of Breeds and Bunker Hill were no longer friends but bitter enemies. And so Ben Franklin, a guy who has been preaching you know, diplomacy at all costs this whole time, finally declares, ye know that he's enemies. What's someone he knows in England? Over this? You can't realize just how a monumentous event was. Isn't there like a lot of debate over who killed one of the British majors during this, Yes, I can't remember which one it was, but there was actually, uh you know, possibility of a few different people that might have killed him. Oh, I believe there may have been even talked that he may have been killed by friendly fire. I can't remember. Now there's a lot of debate on that. So going back to some of the aftermath, this just into a little bit more dey till what are the British thinking now? We talked about how like there was, we talked about how they're pissed off and they're like, hey, this is a war, so we know peace talk or whatever, but how does there like, how did they shift focus or how do they like what's next for the British tagically after this? So the British need to are planning on rolling up the rest of the colonial lines to break that siege. There's still over ten thousand or more men in their way from doing that, but they no longer have the high ground. They are being pushed away. There are reinforcements on the way for the British. They know that much. Oh and so they know that they can't be taken in Boston and they are going to try to sweep the board clean. They need to get rid of the rest of those colonial army, and Gauge actually talks about hiring foreign mercenaries at this point, namely German soldiers and such, to help sweep the board clean without costing two many more British lives. You know, I could have had more John Brown's. Yeah, you didn't have some John Browns we needed. Everyone needs a little more Job Brown in their lives. Shifting foot, So let's talk about the colonialist side. Now, what's what's on the mindset after this? Honestly, a defeat, like it's it's crazy because like the victors always him a mic, the victors always get a right history. It seems like so like this was a defeat technically, but yet when we write this out in American history, it's like almost like triumph over overcome all the odds. We stood the test, we stood up against the British army. It was a defeat, though, But so what is the discussion next, What is going on the founding fathers at this point in time and all that. So this was actually a pretty big moral blow against the clorialists because these farmers are seeing that no matter how hard they tried, the British army kept coming and they you know, that's what I'm saying, Like, when we write history here, it just we shape and the history books and stuff, a lot of research will do it's kind of shape differently. Yeah, but put your point. It was a moral blow here. Yeah, they at this point they were scared. They thought, well, now we may all die. And you know when they when it comes through that the king declares everyone a trader. Uh then they're like, even if we don't get killed in battle, if we lose, then we're gonna die, you know. And uh so, yeah, this caused a lot of desertions. This caused a lot of you know, panic to spread. And you know, the colonial army isn't fully trained yet. There's mostly militia and so like they don't have a regulars yet or not very many, and so like the regulars can't keep order and the you know, the officers are haven't tried hard a hard time keep order as well. And so yeah, this was this was pretty bad, even though they didn't lose nearly as many men. Losing that hill, uh really sitting into a tailspin. And now it was up to the military leaders in place to try to keep the soldiers in line and up to the statesman to try to keep the populace on their side, and it was it was gonna be an uphill battle for him at this point. What the hell was George Washington up to you right now? I don't believe George Washington was actually a part of the fight. He was a closer we approaching that He's just he's just coming up this point in time. Yeah, he's still running his form, but it was definitely coming up because we're getting closer to the next Congress meetings and then planning what to starting to realize they need but this is kind of like proof that that they need somebody. Yeah, and uh, things do change, but right at this point, it's a pretty bleak moment for the colonial army. And you know, as you're saying that they need is someone like a like a symbol or someone to rally behind. It's interesting that some people were trying to be that like Prescott, right and probably as weird as it seems now I've been, uh, but as Arnold was probably trying to be that person. Yeah, where the hell is Benny Dick? Dare? Where is Bennie Dick? He returned to make it back. Yet he gave up after took his commission. It's too took his ball and he went home. He come back. Though he was not participated in this one, he does have one another big thing in the So, yeah, to your there were people trying to step up and be that guy. Yeah, and I guess, you know, for one reason another they just weren't. They worked quite well. Maybe it just it was just hard to outdo Washington. Uh, you know, obviously everyone everyone loves George Washington once he was on the scene. That though, brings us pretty much to the end of the Tale of Bunker Hill. And then the next time we're we are going to hear more from the statesman because they have work to do that the soldiers can't do, and because George Washington is more than just a soldier. He has both a statesman and a soldier. He does make his rounds and both the diplomatic circles and the combat circles. He's really one of the more interesting people to learn about, and I can't wait to hear more about him. Yeah, before we dive into like his introduct we also need to get like a little bit of a backstory because the cool thing about George Washington, is he uh, obviously fought right for the other side and didn't get exactly the recognition that he wanted. And I think that's kind of like, well, I don't want to get too far ahead of myself, but I think he kind of like maybe saw a little bit of himself and Bennedict Arnold. As far as that ambition goes, that's definitely a pretty accurate assumption. I would say, Jack, let's hear from you. Okay, you can find us in America Stories dot us. Did I pick up on the right? Que? Was I supposed to say? Social media? For me? What can you add to this on the website? What are you plan on adding any good visuals or anything, Jack, to go along with what we've talked about. For sure, we'll definitely pick out some image that we can use and we'll put them on put them on this episode there. And also you can follow us on Twitter and America story Pod. Oh yeah, it's xx America story at America story Pod X. Gonna give it to you. Yes, listening to that the other day actually, So we also have an email out there. Is it is that America Story Pod at gmail dot com. I don't even remember early. Uh, let's see, I know it as well. It is America Stories Pod at gmail dot com. Yeah, any comments or anything you want to chime in, or any questions or anything you'd like to see covered a little bit more detail. We definitely jumped into bunker Hill here, and I know we speed through these. We try to keep it like over and a half an hour. A lot happened more than we covered, so we'll try to get some extra stuff up and anything else that's some extra play, so interesting bits that will add on to the show notes. And I just I can't believe there wasn't a John Brown this week. Like you kind of gave a smile, Luke, like you might hold something out of your sleeve, but you never did. Oh, I'm actually thinking about the fact that that's not not my wheelhouse. That'll be Jack doing that. Yeah, Jack, you need to figure out a way to tie in and John Brown. Surely there could have been a somebody fighting name John Brad at this all. I was pretty common. There were a thousand people there are more, so, I mean it's got a bit. Someone was probably named John Brown. I wish I was named John Brown. Anyways, we'll go ahead and we'll get one. We'll get this closed up here and get out of here. But yeah, thanks for checking out the podcast. We appreciate the support. We're having a fun time doing it way back. With the next episode, we'll get a little bit further into the American Revolutionary War here and I'm excited about it. So thank you guys for joining me in for another America story. Until next episode, keep being you and keep being great. Got the kind of face everybody knows. Run around being flu in schools, go into jair and you like your finding the road and you do that's wrong, people, got a big bull, the dangers find an inside. To the best of us, take it what day wrong? Like I said to some of us do the best weekend. Some of must do the best Jeff Townsend Media seezy good night. And the question is do I stay here? Will you be back? Are you gonna come back? Will you be back? Are you coming back?
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