Interpreters at the camp: Alex Crigger, Brian Strong and Matthew Kohler
The Patriots Path, commemorating the 250th anniversary of the start of the American Revolutionary War.
For more on the encampment, visit
More Events:
Mount Vernon will honor George Washington taking command of the Continental Army on June 14, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. with horses and a boat parade on the Potomac River. Visit https://www.mountvernon.org/plan-your-visit/calendar/events/250th-celebration-washington-taking-command .
The National Museum of the U.S. Army at Fort Belvoir is hosting multiple events to celebrate the Army’s 250th anniversary in June, including its exhibition, “Call to Arms: The Soldier and the Revolutionary War,” opening June 7-8. Visit https://www.thenmusa.org/events/
Going to war may be glory, guts and adrenaline rushes, but serving in wartime has its mundane side, as visitors to Mount Vernon’s new Patriot Path can learn by experiencing a typical Revolutionary War Army camp, from sleeping on the ground to eating corn cakes.
Currently, the camp represents 1775, the war’s first year. The components and activities will change somewhat over time to reflect each year of the war. Interpreters describe the daily life of a regiment, typically 60 rank-and-file soldiers, officers and camp followers. Visitors can handle objects and talk to guides in period dress.
On May 4, re-enactors portrayed George Washington’s departure from his beloved Mount Vernon to attend the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia where he was appointed commander-in-chief of the new Continental Army. Washington marched through the camp and out the front gates, accompanied by musicians and reenactors in 18th-century attire. On June 14, Washington will take command of the Continental forces.
The Realities of Military Service
The camp has an officer’s tent, 10 soldiers’ tents, a cook station and a quarter master’s station, the receiving point for supply wagons. The officer’s tent, both an office and sleeping quarters, is oval shaped, nine by 15 feet and has a red, decorative, scalloped edge around the top.
In a clear contrast, five or six soldiers slept crammed into one of the seven-by-seven-foot, canvas wedge tents on a blanket between them and the hard ground. It was probably hot in the summer and cold in the winter inside.
Strewn about in some tents are clothes, knapsacks and a few games like dominoes and playing cards. “They had a lot of time to sit around and do nothing,” said Daniel Cross, Manager of Encampment Interpretation. They were marching or in battle, probably less than 10 percent of the time, he estimates.
“Men spent much of the time playing cards until this practice took up so much time and generated so many arguments that all gambling was outlawed in the winter of 1777,” wrote Bruce Chadwick in The First American Army.
Most of the Continental soldiers were single men, age 16 to 26 and from all walks of life. In 1775, there was no army. The men were initially militia companies raised locally, a ragtag group, by today’s military standards. On June 4, 1775, the Second Continental Congress officially created a standing army and on July 3, 1775, Washington formally took command.
Some clothing, like a dull green hunting frock, hangs from tent poles. There was no real singular military uniform the first year. “It was come-as-you-are,” says Cross, until 1777-1778 when they got some uniforms. Virginians wore red and brown. Marylanders wore red and blue.
Sustenance
Soldiers cooked for themselves over a wood fire. At the Mount Vernon camp’s cooking station under what’s called a fly tent, interpreters cook in iron pots that came from England in the colonial period. The corps master delivers food in wooden barrels, typically salted beef, pork and fish and dried vegetables back then. A typical meal of rations per man consisted of salted meat, beans, rice from South Carolina and bread which was more like a corn cake, visitors learn.
“Men in the army indulged in considerable amount of drinking, a common activity in colonial America,” wrote Chadwick. In a typical encampment, the beer was one to two percent alcohol and they imbibed rum from the Caribbean to “keep morale up,” Cross said.
Visitors to Mount Vernon’s Patriot’s Path will see a few women because some wives followed the Army, Cross explained. “Women in camp had to earn their keep,” he offered. “Some were nurses, some petty sutlers (merchants) and some did laundry.” For every 24 men, there was one woman, he estimated. Some women trailed along because it could be dangerous living alone at home and they could not manage the farm or raise children alone. They had little autonomy, were not wealthy and were better off in camp than on the farm, Cross said.
This living history camp and Washington’s departure represent the beginning of the nation’s multi-year celebration of its birth 250 years ago.