At Saratoga, after defeats in the Battles of Saratoga on September 19 and October 7, 1777, British General John Burgoyne retreated north to Saratoga, present-day Schuylerville, and after a short siege surrendered his army of nearly 7,000 people to American General Horatio Gates on October 17, 1777, ending British plans to conquer upstate New York and capture Albany. News of the surrender quickly helped bring French recognition of United States independence and a formal alliance, which widened the conflict as France and later Spain, the Netherlands, and Mysore went to war against Britain, helping turn the American struggle into a worldwide conflict that ultimately contributed to peace after Yorktown in 1781 and the end of the War for Independence in 1783. The upper Hudson Valley around Saratoga had long been home to indigenous peoples, including the Mohawk and Mohican, and later saw Dutch settlement, conflict over trade and land, European land patents, plantation building, slavery, tenant farming, canal development, and farming by the Germain family. After remaining in private ownership following the surrender, the site was preserved beginning in 2006 through support from New York State officials, the Open Space Institute, Friends of the Saratoga Battlefield, the Historic Hudson-Hoosic Rivers Partnership, the Alfred Z. Solomon Foundation, the Town of Saratoga, the New York State Natural Heritage Trust, the American Battlefield Protection Program, and other partners so that this turning-point landscape would be protected and opened for future generations.

Photo: Steve Stoessel

Photo: Steve Stoessel

Photo: Steve Stoessel