The Revolutionary War was a civil war: British loyalists at the Battle of Brandywine in Chadds Ford

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The Battle of Brandywine in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, in 1777 was the largest and longest land battle of the Revolutionary War, and it may have been the loudest.

“The firing was so intense that Congress, all the way in Philadelphia, could actually hear the cannon fire,” said Randell Spackman, president of the Chadds Ford Historical Society, which stages a re-enactment of the Battle of Brandywine every year.

“They knew something big was happening at Brandywine,” he said.

The battle was a great defeat for Gen. George Washington, allowing the British army to occupy Philadelphia.

But for many Americans, it was a great victory.

The Battle of Brandywine was an example of how the Revolutionary Way was a civil war. About 500 colonists fought at Brandywine on the side of the British as loyalists, firing at their neighbors and countrymen.

Spackman acted as host and emcee of the reenactment last September, making announcements and introducing the artillery demonstrations while dressed as a loyalist in a British red coat.

“You best learn history by walking both shoes,” he said. “History is always written by the winners. When you portray the other side, you see a different perspective. You hear different stories.”

Independence divided towns and families

The dream of independence was not shared by all Americans, not by a long shot. The population was generally split into thirds, with about 30% siding with the patriots, 30% with the king and 30% trying to remain neutral, the so-called “disaffected.” With the large number of Quakers living in and around Philadelphia who attempted to remove themselves from the conflict, support for the patriots’ cause was far from unanimous.

Those rifts divided families, such as the Allen brothers, a prominent family after which Allentown is named. Two of the Allens, John and James, tried to keep a distance from the conflict, while the other two, Andrew and William, explicitly sided with the king.

“William Allen started the Revolution as a colonel in the Pennsylvania Continental Line,” said historian Todd Braisted. “When the Declaration of Independence happened, he resigned his commission and joined the British.”

The Declaration of Independence of 1776 was a bright line for many colonists who at first opposed the British government for decisions like the Stamp Act and excessive taxes, but who never wanted to sever themselves from England.

“Most people had some issue with the British government. In 2025, we can understand people having some issues with their government,” Braisted said. “A lot of people who had problems with the British government did not wish to break away from that government. They wished for what they referred to as ‘redress of grievances.’ They wanted to stand up for their rights as Englishmen, not break away from the empire.”

Many loyalists were turned off by what they saw was a government run by the patriots that was poorly organized, at best, and at worst, little better than mob rule. The Declaration of Independence inspired some and filled others with dread.

Stories of loyalists

James Parker, a Scottish immigrant in Norfolk, Virginia, witnessed the harassment of loyalists by Patriots in January 1776 resulting in the Burning of Norfolk. His home was looted and burned and his wife and daughters fled with no possessions other than the clothes they were wearing.

A year and a half later, Parker was at the Battle of Brandywine fighting for the British, still seething with hatred of the patriots’ cause. In his memoirs, he recalled that while out on patrol before the battle started he came within gunfire range of Gen. George Washington.

“My prayers went with the ball that it might finish Washington and the rebellion altogether,” Parker wrote, cited in Thomas McGuire’s “The Philadelphia Campaign Vol. 1: Brandywine and the Fall of Philadelphia.”

Stephen Jarvis, of Connecticut, started the war by defying his father, a Tory loyal to England, and joining a local militia aligned with the patriots. He later switched sides, fighting at Brandywine with the Queens Rangers, a loyalist regiment out of New Jersey.

In his memoirs written after the war, Jarvis recounts how he was more than happy to take a bullet for the king.

“My pantaloons received a wound,” Jarvis wrote, cited in Braisted’s “Online Institute for Advanced Loyalist Studies.” “I don’t hesitate to say that I should be very well pleased to have seen a little blood.”

After the war Jarvis relocated to Canada, where he is now memorialized as a British hero.

To many loyalists, the Revolution represented chaos and England represented stability. That can even be seen on the reenactment field at Chadds Ford, where soldiers in red coats marched in tight formation, while blue coats had little shape to their line.

“Once I saw it for the first time, I’m like, ‘Well, I’m glad I’m on the British side,’” said reenactor Bob Capella, of Haddonfield, New Jersey, who performed as a loyalist with the First New Jersey Volunteers.

“They’re just so unorganized,” he said of the opposing Patriots. “When I see the battle and how regimented we are, how fearful we must have been to a bunch of farmers, it’s like: ‘Why are we fighting against the king?’ It’s amazing how it was pulled off, with the sheer will of the brilliance of George Washington.”

Playing both sides of the war

Some soldiers at Brandywine were committed to neither the loyalist nor patriot side. They were opportunists who would flip-flop across enemy lines over the course of the war as the prospects of victory fluctuated.

Braisted traced the war records of William Shoemaker, a man from Sussex County, New Jersey who fought at Brandywine as a Patriot with the Second New Jersey Regiment. Combing through prisoner of war records and Shoemaker’s application for a pension years after the war ended, Braisted pieced together his journey on both sides of the war.

Somewhere in Bucks County, Shoemaker deserted his patriot patrol and joined a British patrol marching toward New York City. He was later captured by the Continental Army and pressed into service against the British.

According to his pension application, he was then recaptured by the British and fought at the Battle of Springfield in 1780, firing upon the same Patriot regiment he was a part of just weeks previously.

“What is important to look at on a local level for rank-and-file guys, the guys who are serving in the ranks, is day-to-day issues: Am I being paid? Do I have food? Do I have shelter? Do I have clothing?,” Braisted said. “If your side is not providing all those things, then you see who else is hiring.”

The British army dangled a great carrot for patriots considering defection in the form of land. After the war, no matter how it ended, recruits were promised acreage either in the colonies or, as it ultimately came about, in Canada, a strong incentive for poorer soldiers who otherwise would have had little chance to become a landowner in their lifetimes.

One of Braisted’s favorite flip-floppers is Nathan Pushee, a soldier who fought on both sides of the war, then double-dipped his pension.

Pushee fought at the Battle of Brandywine as a patriot with the 3rd Infantry Light Dragoons. In 1780, he was captured by the British and sent to Charleston, South Carolina. To survive the deprivations of a prisoner of war camp, he agreed to join the British army and fought in Jamaica. For Pushee’s services to the crown, he was awarded 35 acres in Nova Scotia, Canada.

Later, in 1838, the U.S. Congress loosened requirements for a war pension, and Pushee saw an opportunity. He applied for and ultimately received a $1,000 soldier’s pension for serving in the Continental Army.

Unfortunately, Pushee died on the return trip home to his British acreage.

“I don’t know how exactly he died, but I have a pretty good imagination,” Braisted said. “All of a sudden, you’re getting over $1,000. Party city.”

“The story doesn’t end there. His wife ends up getting a widow’s pension from Congress. By the 1850s, that family has over 100 children, great-grandchildren and great-great-grandchildren, all in Nova Scotia living it up at the expense of Congress,” he said. “God bless America.”