--- In Revlist@yahoogroups.com, "bvogler" <bvogler@...> wrote:
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> List-
> Until fairly recently, I have not been a student of militia operations in the
American War. My perceptions were colored by criticisms of the militia's
performance in formal battle by Continental officers such as MG N. Greene after
the battle of Guilford Courthouse. But, after purchasing it 12 months ago, I am
finally getting around to reading the excellent __With Zeal & With Bayonets
Only__ by Matthew H. Spring.
>
> The author makes a point which I had never considered which might point to the
militia's most valuable service in the war...... social control. "But perhaps
the most valuable overall role that the militia played in the rebel war effort
was as an 'armed revolutionary constabulary, militia structures represented the
nearest thing the local authorities had to a police force....wherever British
troops were not immediately in force, the militia ensured popular compliance
with the rebel government. It also forcibly suppressed loyalist activity, using
terror where necessary. In short, the rebels' control of the militia ensured
that [as Greene put it at Valley Forge] 'the limits of the British government in
America are their out-sentinels.'"
>
> The potency of the militia in this type of civil-military enforcement, made
those who cooperated with the Crown's forces by providing food, intelligence, or
general assistance a dangerous endeavor.
>
> In addition in South Carolina for example, the militia's partisan actions made
the over-land resupply to men and material to Royal garrisons a dangerous
process.
>
> While the militia's head-on battle performance with British Regulars might not
have been totally reliable, Lord Cornwallis stated "I will not say much in
praise of the militia in the southern colonies, but the list of British officers
and soldiers killed and wounded by them since last June proves but too fatally
that they are not wholly contemptible."
>
> And so it goes,
> Bob V.

Bob,
Very true.
In Pennsylvania, there were "associators" and "non-associators" ,(pre-March
1777 Militia Act of Pa. ). After March of '77 they were officially called
Militia. Citizens either tory, or pacifist, were constantly harrassed by the
"associat-ed" militia, who were required to, and cheerfully signed, loyalty
oaths and formed the battalions that took the field by numerical class. Not all
the associators of a given area of alarm would be called out en-masse so as not
to strip local towns and villages of all defenses. When a man joined his local
Comapany he would be assigned a class number, ie; Class 1, Class 2, Class 3,
etc.
Anyone not joining the Associators were branded non-associators and were
subject to levies and fines, indiscriminate looting of property deemed usable
for the Patriot cause, personal attacks by the more "inspired" Patriots, and
some deaths were even reported. So what I know about the Pa. Associators would
pretty much fall in line with what you read at least in the case of Pa. Some
might equate ( in basic theory, not in scope of brutality) that these Militiamen
were the SA or Brownshirts of their day(?)
Cheers,
Bob ( Helmut ) Bolton
Pa. Associators
:)
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