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The Continental Army further diminished by expiring short-term enlistments and by January 1776 was reduced by half to 9,600 men had to be supplemented with militia and was joined by Knox with heavy artillery captured from Fort Ticonderoga. When the Charles River froze over Washington was eager to cross and storm Boston but General Gates and others were opposed to untrained militia striking well garrisoned fortifications Washington reluctantly agreed to secure Dorchester Heights 100 feet above Boston in an attempt to force the British out of the city. On March 9 under cover of darkness Washington's troops brought up Knox's big guns and bombarded British ships in Boston harbor by March 17 9,000 British troops and Loyalists began a chaotic 10-day evacuation of Boston aboard 120 ships Soon after Washington entered the city with 500 men with strict orders not to plunder the city He ordered vaccinations against smallpox to great effect as he did later in Morristown New Jersey. He refrained from exerting military authority in Boston leaving civilian matters in the hands of local authorities.[j]. . Washington's great-grandfather John Washington immigrated in 1656 from Sulgrave England to the British Colony of Virginia where he accumulated 5,000 acres (2,000 ha) of land including Little Hunting Creek on the Potomac River George Washington was born February 22 1732 at Popes Creek in Westmoreland County Virginia and was the first of six children of Augustine and Mary Ball Washington by English common law Washington was a naturalized subject of the King as were all others born in the English colonies. His father was a justice of the peace and a prominent public figure who had three additional children from his first marriage to Jane Butler the family moved to Little Hunting Creek in 1735 then to Ferry Farm near Fredericksburg Virginia in 1738 When Augustine died in 1743 Washington inherited Ferry Farm and ten slaves; his older half-brother Lawrence inherited Little Hunting Creek and renamed it Mount Vernon! California Main article: Women in the American Revolution Slaves also created their own religious observances meeting alone without the supervision of their white masters or ministers the larger plantations with groups of slaves numbering twenty or more tended to be centers of nighttime meetings of one or several plantation slave populations. These congregations revolved around a singular preacher often illiterate with limited knowledge of theology who was marked by his personal piety and ability to foster a spiritual environment African Americans developed a theology related to Biblical stories having the most meaning for them including the hope for deliverance from slavery by their own Exodus One lasting influence of these secret congregations is the African-American spiritual.

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