Happy Independence Day! A quick History of the Minute Men, Americas special Militia operatives

It is July 4th in the USA and we are celebrating the day we won the War Of Independence and started forming a country out of the disparate colonies in the new world. Being a Boston born American, I grew up around the cities of Plymouth and Lexington, worked the very docks that hosted the Boston Tea party so it's easy to say I have been all in on the freedom loving and tough culture we had here at the start of this great nation. We have plenty of problems around here nowadays but there's plenty of time for that another day.

Today I wanted to bring up an interesting bit of history that may be less known and certainly misunderstood group of fighters that helped win the war, the Minute Men.
Most history buffs, I assume, think they were a militia made up of ordinary citizens who came together like a guerilla group to fight the British in the revolutionary war but that is not the full truth of it by a longshot. It is true that they were not actual soldiers in the British army, they formed by them to help fight against the French colonialists and the Native Americans that allied with them. The British knew as early as the year 1745 AD that they could no longer defend their colonies in Massachusetts and New Hampshire now that the natives were being trained and armed by the French, so they began training their own men to fight for themselves.

Train and fight they did becoming more like a mercenary group rather than a town militia. The average militia here at that time trained about once or twice a month under an English officer and didn't have much of choice in the matter being subjects to the King and Crown after all. The Minute Men were of a different sort, they went to drill a few ties a week and were paid to do so. These guys were becoming warriors not because someone told them to, they were the ones who were sick and tired of seeing the endless raids go unchecked. They fought to keep their neighbors safe and their families with a home a enough food to eat.

They ended up being so well respected that their elites did end up fighting along side the British army and securing Massachusetts by the early 1750s. It wasn't until 1774 that they disassociated themselves with the crown and decommissioned their officers to become independent. I guess ole Georgy boy should have taken that as a sign of things to come ;)

Here are a few links for more information on the Minute Men and video too, why not
https://www.nps.gov/mima/learn/education/who-were-the-minute-men.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minutemen

Thanks for Reading guys and I hope you all have a great holiday!