Regular Army (United States) - Continental Army

Continental Army

The United States Army traces its origin to the founding of the Continental Army on June 14, 1775, when the Continental Congress authorized enlistment of riflemen from Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia to join the New England militia army besieging Boston in order to serve the United Colonies for one year. Late in 1776, Congress called for the Continental Army to serve for the duration of the war. The army was to consist of 88 battalions raised and equipped by the states, with officers appointed by the States. Appointment of officers actually continued to be a collaboration between Congress, the Commander in Chief, George Washington, and the States. The number of battalions was to be apportioned to the States according to their population. While the initial number of battalions approached the authorized strength, the infantry of the entire Continental establishment was reduced to fifty battalions by 1 January 1781 because failure to be able to maintain a larger number of regiments. During the Revolutionary War, battalions and regiments were essentially the same. By October 19, 1781 when the British army under General Cornwallis surrendered to the Americans and French allies at Yorktown, the Continental Army had grown back to sixty battalions.

The Continental Army was supported during the war by many State militia units for varying short periods of time and by a few separate volunteer State regiments, usually organized only for local service. Despite the difficulties of training and equipping part-time or short term soldiers and using them in combination with professionally trained regulars, the Americans succeeded in fielding a large enough army to prevail without keeping a large army in the field at all times or establishing a large permanent army.

Because of the inability of Congress to raise much revenue under the Articles of Confederation, American suspicion of standing armies and perceived safety from foreign enemies provided by large oceans effectively controlled by the then non-threatening British navy, Congress disbanded the Continental Army after the Treaty of Paris, the peace treaty with Great Britain, became effective. Congress retained 80 caretaker soldiers to protect arms and equipment at West Point, New York and Fort Pitt and called on the States to furnish 700 men from their militias for one year of service on the frontier. The delegates to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787 recognized the need for a more permanent military establishment and provided for a national regular army and navy and a militia under state control, subject to civilian control through congressional control of appropriations and presidential leadership as commander in chief of the regular forces and of the militia when called into federal service.