page_title: Minutemen
section_title: Equipment, training, and tactics
hierarchical_section_title: Minutemen / Equipment, training, and tactics
caption_attribution_description: English: Minutemen monument in Hollis, New Hampshire
context_page_description: Minutemen were civilian colonists who independently organized to form militia companies self-trained in weaponry, tactics, and military strategies from the American colonial partisan militia during the American Revolutionary War. They were known for being ready at a minute's notice, hence the name. Minutemen provided a highly mobile, rapidly deployed force that enabled the colonies to respond immediately to war threats.
  The minutemen were among the first to fight in the American Revolution. Their teams constituted about a quarter of the entire militia. They were generally younger and more mobile.
  The term has also been applied to various later United States civilian-based paramilitary forces to recall the success and patriotism of the originals.
context_section_description: Most Colonial militia units were provided neither arms nor uniforms and were required to equip themselves. Many simply wore their own farmers' or workmen's clothes and, in some cases, they wore cloth hunting frocks. Most used fowling pieces, though rifles were sometimes used where available.  Neither fowling pieces nor rifles had bayonets.  Some colonies purchased muskets, cartridge boxes, and bayonets from England, and maintained armories within the colony.
  The Continental Army regulars received European-style military training later in the American Revolutionary War, but the militias did not get much of this. They were better when used as irregulars rather than fighting formal battles in the traditional dense lines and columns, functioning primarily as skirmishers and sharpshooters. When used in conjunction with continental regulars, the militia would frequently fire ragged irregular volleys from a forward skirmish line or from the flanks of the Continental Army, while Continental soldiers held the center.
  Their experience suited irregular warfare. Many were familiar with frontier hunting. The Indian Wars, and especially the recent French and Indian War, had taught the colonials the value of irregular warfare, while many English troops fresh from Europe were less familiar with this. The long rifle was also well suited to this role. The rifling (grooves inside the barrel) gave it a much greater range than the smoothbore musket, although it took much longer to load. Because of the lower rate of fire, rifles were not used by regular infantry, but were preferred for hunting. When performing as skirmishers, the militia could fire and fall back behind cover or behind other troops, before the British could get into range. The wilderness terrain that lay just beyond many colonial towns favored this style of combat and was very familiar to the local minuteman. In time, however, loyalists such as John Butler and Robert Rogers mustered equally capable irregular forces (Butler's Rangers and the Queen's Rangers, led by Englishman John Graves Simcoe). In addition, many British commanders learned from experience and effectively modified their light infantry tactics and battle dress to suit conditions in North America.
  Through the remainder of the Revolution, militias moved to adopting the minuteman model for rapid mobilization. With this rapid mustering of forces, the militia proved its value by augmenting the Continental Army on a temporary basis, occasionally leading to instances of numerical superiority. This was seen at the Battles of Hubbardton and Bennington in the north and at Camden and Cowpens in the south. Cowpens is notable in that Daniel Morgan used the militia's strengths and weaknesses skillfully to attain the double-envelopment of Tarleton's forces.
  Historian M. L. Brown states that some of these men mastered the difficult handling of a rifle, though few became expert. Brown quotes Continental Army soldier Benjamin Thompson, who expressed the "common sentiment" at the time, which was that minutemen were notoriously poor marksmen with rifles: "Instead of being the best marksmen in the world and picking off every Regular that was to be seen, the continual firing which they kept up by the week and the month has had no other effect than to waste their ammunition and convince the King's troops that they are really not really so formidable." 
  There was a shortage of ammunition and supplies, and what they had were constantly being seized by British patrols. As a precaution, these items were often hidden or left behind by minutemen in fields or wooded areas. Other popular concealment methods were to hide items underneath floorboards in houses and barns.
caption: Minutemen monument in Hollis, New Hampshire
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