“Remember officers and Soldiers, that you are Freemen, fighting for the blessings of Liberty–that slavery will be your portion, and that of your posterity, if you do not acquit yourselves like men: Remember how your Courage and Spirit have been disposed, and traduced by your cruel invaders; though they have found by dear experience at Boston, Charlestown and other places, what a few brave men contending in their own land, and in the best of causes can do, against base hirelings and mercenaries.”
George Washington, Letter to the Continental Congress on the Battle of Long Island, August 23, 1776