June 29, 2017
Happy Birthday Wishes to our Country!
By Eloise Graham
I remember 1976 and all of the patriotic whoopla that accompanied the 200th birthday of our nation. Do you? Seems like just yesterday. In nine short years we will be celebrating the 250th birthday. Did you ever stop and wonder if, in 1967, people in their sixties, seventies or eighties thought, “Seems like just yesterday we were celebrating our country’s 150th birthday. Soon we will be celebrating its bicentennial.”?
The birth of our nation took nine years, April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783. Independence from Great Britain was declared in 1776 with the formal writing of the declaration document on July 4, 1776. However, not all signatures of the members of the Continental Congress were obtained until August of 1776.
Ten facts about the war and General Washington
1. Washington was appointed commander of the Continental Army on June 14, 1775.
2. Prior to his appointment as head of the Continental Army, Washington had never commanded a large army in the field
3. Washington and the Continental Army narrowly escaped total destruction in the New York campaign of 1776.
4. Washington crossed the Delaware River twice in December 1776. Once was to cross into Pennsylvania, taking Hessian captives with him. The second time was to take the troops back into a strong position outside of Trenton to await the arrival of Cornwallis.
5. Washington’s smallpox inoculation program was one of his best decisions of the war.
6. Supply issues became one of Washington’s greatest challenges.
7. Mount Vernon escaped destruction in 1781.
8. Prior to its decisive victory at Yorktown, the American military teetered upon total collapse.
9. Washington deftly put down a growing military rebellion. By March of 1783, a growing number of American military officers became discouraged by lack of regular pay and financial support. Washington heard of this and gathered all of the officers together. He had prepared a speech. His closing comments accentuated with a theatrical flair. He reached into his pocket and retrieved a pair of spectacles, then finished with, “…I have not only grown gray, but almost blind in the service to my country.” This display changed the minds of the rebelling officers to return to their affection of their leader.
10. Washington’s greatest display of power was his surrender of power. December 23, 1783, he strode into the statehouse at Annapolis and surrendered his military commission. An astonished King George III, when he learned of Washington’s intent, uttered that, “If he does that, he will be the greatest man in the world.”
So, Happy Birthday wishes to our country!
