American uniforms in the Revolutionary War could be red, blue, brown, or look like patchwork quilt. Some men were ragged and without proper clothes and some men were equipped with the best. A proper American uniform was scarce at the beginning of the war but the Patriots gradually decided on this.

In 1775 brown was the official color of uniforms in the 13 colonies but some states went off on their own. New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Rhode Island, and Connecticut wore white facing; New York and New Jersey wore ‘buff’ facing; Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia wore red facing; North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia wore blue facing with buttonholes edged with white, narrow tape or lace.

Uniforms also told you what kind of soldier a man was. One way was to use shoulder patches or epaulettes. They could use color, for example, a Corporal wore a green patch and a Sergeant wore a red. Sometimes they used which side the epaulettes were on. For example Subalterns wore a yellow patch on their left and a Captain would were his yellow patch on his right.

Officers with two epaulettes would often go by stars on the patches.

The more stars you had the higher in rank you were. For example, an American Brigadier General would wear one Silver Star on each patch, a Major General would wear two stars, last the Commander in Chief would wear three stars on each patch.

Another way would be different hats. One identification would be cockades or knots of colored ribbon worn as badges on hats. Americans wore black cockades and the French wore white until they eventually joined together to make the Union cockade which was half-black and half-white. Feathers were worn out of cockades for further identification. Brigadier Generals wore white feathers while Major generals wore half-black and half-white feathers. An ACD for a General would wear a bright green feather and an ACD for a Commander in Chief would wear a half-green and half-white feather.

The Revolutionary War was a war with many battles and riots like the Battle of Trenton and the Boston Massacre but what lasted throughout the war were the uniforms. They distinguished Minutemen from Lobsterbacks

and footmen from Corporals. The uniforms were truly the backbone of the war.