Talk:Battle of Brandywine

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[edit] American or Patriot army?

I'll revert "Patriot army" in favor of "American army," as patriot seem quite POV. POV from the other side might be "Rebel army," "Colonial army," or even "Traitor army." I'd think there is a community of American Revolutionary War editors who have probably dealt with this before. Rather than have an edit war, why not ask them if you disagree with my (unasked for) third opinion. Smallbones (talk) 01:36, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

The term "American Army" is not accurate when referring to the American Revolution. At this point, it was a volunteer or state army only. There was no Federal Army until much, much later. The term "Patriot" is used to this day to refer to the rebel militias that fought British. A good compromise my be "Colonial Army". —Preceding unsigned comment added by DevinCook (talk • contribs) 02:51, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

According to all offical source all branches of the armed forces of the United States were called "continental" forces during the revolutionary war. TomStar81 (Talk) 04:41, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

None of the above answers are quite correct. Starting in 1775, George Washington led an establishment known as the Continental Army, which was an army of the 13 colonies, who became the 13 states in 1776. It was, in theory if not always in practice, a national (or "federal" army). In addition to the Continental Army were state militias who turned out for short periods to help the Continental Army. Militiamen were not part of the Continental Army. At Brandywine, you have both the Pennsylvania militia and the Continental Army, which can be referred to as such when talking about them individually. Taken together, there's no single standard way to refer to both Continentals and militia, but "American army" (small case "army") is widely used and perfectly clear; an older term is "Revolutionary army". Generally, the term Patriot is used when you want to distinguish American revolutionaries from American Loyalists. —Kevin Myers 04:57, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to agree with Kevin on this one. "American army" does not refer to a "federal force" it refers to "American forces" - whether it be the Continental Army, state militias, or any combination of the two...in the same way that "British forces" usually encompass Hessian mercenaries, loyalist regiments, and the like. Alphageekpa (talk) 11:05, 14 May 2008 (UTC)