olonies into a confrontation with the British.The Battle of Bunker Hill started when the colonists learned about the British plan to occupy Dorchester Heights. The colonists were understandably shaken by this news. They thought of this as the last straw, and they had to protect their land and freedom. A crude "army" was made to defend the hill. The army was not a national one, for no nation existed. Instead, the army was made up of men from Cambridge, New England, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island. Also, this hastily combined force of men had no assigned commander in chief, but did what their revered Generals instructed them to carry out.On June 15, 1775 the American colonists heard news that the British planned to control the Charlestown peninsula between the Charles and Mystic Rivers. Bunker's and Breed's Hill on this peninsula overlooked both Boston and its harbor, thus making the hills critical vantage points. In order to beat the British to the high ground, General Prescott took 1,200 of his often times undisciplined, disobedient, and sometimes intoxicated soldiers to dig into and fortify Bunker Hill with the cover of night on June 16. When dawn broke, the British were stunned to see Breed's Hill fortified overnight with a 160-by-30-foot earthen structure. The British General, Gage, dispatched 2,300 troops under the command of Major General Howe to take control of the hill (Encyclopedia Britannica 1990).So it came to be that General Prescott did not actually fortify Bunker's Hill, but Breed's Hill instead. How did this happen? One proposed idea is that that Colonel William Prescott, since fortifying the hill in the middle of the night, chose the wrong hill. Another theory is that the map the Colonel used was incorrect, since many maps during this period had commonly misidentified the hills. Another suggestion, and probably the most practical, is that Breed's Hill is closer to where the British ships were p...
