On this day 250 years ago at Trois-Rivieres (Three Rivers) in the Quebec Province of Canada, a force of 2,000 Continentals under General William Thompson attempted in the early morning hours before daylight to attack the British position. The Americans were betrayed by their Canadian guide and led into a swamp where they were pinned down and surrounded by more than a thousand British soldiers supported by the HMS Martin and more than 20 other British vessels. The Americans had launched the attack at Trois-Rivieres believing that the British had landed only a few hundred troops from three vessels and did not understand the full extent of the British forces they were engaging. By the next day Gen. Thompson had surrendered with many of his men but Col. Anthony Wayne was able to fight his way through the British and returned to the American camp with 1,100 men. The operation was a disaster for the Continental Army, which lost about 40 men killed in addition to the 236 soldiers captured by the British. In contrast, the British had only eight killed and nine wounded.
Sources: https://revolutionarywarjournal.com/battle-of-three-rivers-june-8-1775/
On this day 250 years ago in Philadelphia, the conservative Pennsylvania Assembly voted 31 to I2, to authorize the colony’s delegation in the Continental Congress
to concur in forming such further compacts between the United Colonies, concluding such treaties with foreign kingdoms and states, and in adopting such other measures as shall be judged necessary . . . reserving to the people of this colony the sole and exclusiveright of regulating the internal government.
The Pennsylvania Assembly had succumbed to the pressure of the people of Philadelphia who were clamoring for Independence.
Source: Paul Leicester Ford, “The Adoption of the Pennsylvania Constitution of 1776”, Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 10, No. 3 (Sep. 1895) at p. 447 accessed at https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/2139954.pdf?refreqid=fastly-default%3Ac02e65801bed23e5fa4a42d0eaf29aad&ab_segments=&initiator=&acceptTC=1
On This Day In The Revolution 