On August 16, 1777, General John Stark led a patriot force of mostly militiamen to victory over British, Loyalist, and Hessian units at the Battle of Bennington. Before battle, Stark declared: “There are your enemies, the Redcoats and the Tories. They are ours or this night Molly Stark sleeps a widow!”
Stark’s triumph on August 16th derailed the British plan to split the colonies. Commanding fiercely independent New England frontiersmen who refused to serve under the Continental Army, Stark executed a brilliant multi-pronged envelopment that surrounded elite German dragoons searching for supplies.
The savage firefight in the Walloomsac hills ended in the near-total destruction of the invading force. This deprived British General John Burgoyne of reinforcements and horses just weeks before his surrender at Saratoga. Stark’s ultimatum captured the personal stakes of frontier defenders, turning a desperate defense of homesteads into an immortal rallying cry for independence.
