Saratoga and Valley Forge

Student Historians are learning about how significant the battles of Saratoga and the winter at Valley Forge were to the American Revolution. 

The Saratoga victory was a turning point because France and Spain decided that maybe the Continental Army could, in fact, win and began to send desperately needed supplies and people to train the American soldiers. Tomorrow students will analyze the impact this boost had on the outcome of the war. 

We will also begin to study the winter at Valley Forge, using a diary entry from Albigence Waldo, a surgeon that served there. Valley Forge was an incredibly challenging time for the Continental soldiers and Thomas Paine's words from one year earlier help to shed light on the difficulties for these young men: 

These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot
will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now,
deserves the love and thanks of man and woman…
Thomas Paine, The American Crisis

Students will apply these words to Valley Forge and I am looking forward to their analysis.

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