Chapter
6 Section 3
Objectives
• Discover the role that African Americans played
in the American Revolution.
• Find out how the war affected women and other
civilians.
• Learn about the progress of the fighting on the
western frontier and at sea.
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Chapter
6 Section 3
Terms and People
• enlist – sign up for duty
• civilian – person not in the military
• continental – paper money printed by the
Continental Congress
• George Rogers Clark – Virginian who led
American troops against the British on the
western frontier
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Chapter
6 Section 3
Terms and People (continued)
• Bernardo de Gálvez – governor of Louisiana
who played a major role in Spanish attacks
against the British
• John Paul Jones – American naval commander
who won a key battle against the British
• privateer – armed civilian ship given its
government’s permission to attack enemy ships
and keep their goods
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Chapter
6 Section 3
How did the effects of the war
widen?
While Continental soldiers faced battle in
the thirteen colonies, many people in other
places also felt the war’s effects.
American Revolution
Native
Americans
Western
settlers
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Women
African
Americans
Chapter
6 Section 3
African Americans fought on both sides
during the American Revolution.
Patriots
African Americans
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British
Chapter
6 Section 3
Free African Americans fought for the
Patriots from the beginning, seeing action at
several key battles.
• Lexington and Concord
• Bunker Hill
• Saratoga
Some enslaved people also supported the
Americans after escaping from their owners.
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Chapter
6 Section 3
If they fought for the British, however, enslaved
people were offered something of immense value.
Freedom
To gain their freedom, thousands of enslaved
Americans fled their owners and joined the
British.
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Chapter
6 Section 3
At first, George Washington refused to accept
African American soldiers.
Washington reversed his policy, however, after so
many African Americans began to join the British
forces.
By the end of the war, more than 7,000
African Americans had fought for the
Patriots.
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Chapter
6 Section 3
Women, too, were affected by the war, often
taking on new responsibilities.
Men who
enlisted were
away for at
least one year
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At home, women:
• planted crops
• tended livestock
• ran businesses
Chapter
6 Section 3
Some women followed their husbands into
battle.
They provided
supplies, food,
and water. They
cared for the
wounded.
Some, like Molly
Pitcher, stepped
in to fight when
her husband fell.
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6 Section 3
Soldiers and civilians alike were affected by
the financial burdens of paying for the war.
• Congress had no
power to tax, and
the states had little
money.
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Continental
Continental
Continental
Value
• Congress printed
continentals to pay
expenses, but the
money soon lost its
value.
Continental
Amount printed
Chapter
Chapter
6 Section 3
Those on the western frontier also felt the war’s
effects.
Native
Americans
British
Most Native Americans sided with the British,
fearing an American victory would bring more
settlers onto their lands.
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Chapter
6 Section 3
Many Indian groups, however, were bitterly
divided about which side to support. Some split
into warring factions.
A deadly epidemic added to the crushing effects
of war.
Infighting
Smallpox
Native Americans
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Western
raids
Chapter
6 Section 3
George Rogers Clark pushed west to strike
British forts on the frontier.
Clark won key
battles against the
British and their
Native American
allies.
These victories
allowed settlers
to remain on the
frontier.
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Chapter
6 Section 3
Clark and other Americans were given help
by the Spanish, who declared war on Britain
in 1779.
Patriots
Spanish
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Chapter
6 Section 3
Bernardo de Gálvez, the governor of Louisiana,
played a key role in Spanish attacks that captured
British forts along the Mississippi and the Gulf of
Mexico.
British
Spanish
Gálvez also gave refuge to American ships in New
Orleans harbor.
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Chapter
6 Section 3
The Americans needed the help. Their small navy
was no match for the British fleet, which
dominated the seas.
British ships
blockaded most
American ports
Thirteen
colonies
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Chapter
6 Section 3
A much-needed naval victory was won off the
English coast when John Paul Jones refused to
give up a long and difficult fight, forcing a British
ship to surrender.
Privateers also helped the Americans, seizing
supplies and goods from British merchant ships.
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Chapter
6 Section 3
Section Review
QuickTake Quiz
The War Widens
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