Saratoga campaign

Overview

The Saratoga campaign in 1777 was an attempt by the British to gain military control of the strategically important Hudson River valley during the American Revolutionary War. It ended in the surrender of a British army, which historian Edmund Morgan argues, "was a great turning point of the war, because it won for Americans the foreign assistance which was the last element needed for victory."

Overview adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Significance

The Saratoga campaign of 1777 was a British attempt to seize military control of the Hudson River valley, a strategically vital corridor during the American Revolutionary War. The campaign ended in the surrender of a British army, an outcome historian Edmund Morgan identifies as a great turning point of the war. According to Morgan, the defeat secured for the Americans the foreign assistance that constituted the last element needed for victory. With a British force of roughly 8,500 facing a combined American strength of approximately 25,000 under commanders including Horatio Gates and Benedict Arnold, the scale of the British loss lent the outcome sufficient weight to alter the international dimension of the conflict.

Forces & casualties

Commanders (21)