From the radical philosophers of the South Wales valleys to the copper mines that sheathed the Royal Navy and the ironworks that cast its cannon, Wales played a vital if often overlooked role in the American Revolution — providing both the materials of war and some of the ideas behind it.
Base: Swansea
Birthplace of Francis Lewis, Declaration signer for New York, born 21 March 1713. His father Rev. Francis Lewis was rector of Llandaff. Orphaned at about age 5, Lewis emigrated at 21 and became a New York merchant. He co-founded the Sons of Liberty and signed the Declaration in 1776. His wife was captured by the British and died from harsh imprisonment in 1779.
Distance: 123.4 km · Drive: 86 min
Birthplace of Richard Price, the Welsh philosopher whose 1776 pamphlet 'Observations on the Nature of Civil Liberty' sold 60,000 copies as a powerful defence of the American cause; the Continental Congress thanked him and offered American citizenship.
Distance: 40.9 km · Drive: 51 min
One of Swansea's oldest copper smelting works, active during the American war as part of the supply chain for Royal Navy copper sheathing critical to British naval operations.
Museum on the site of ironworks established by Anthony Bacon in 1765, who held government contracts to supply cannon and shot for the British military; the Merthyr Tydfil iron district expanded rapidly during the American war years.
Base: Caernarfon
Ironworks where John 'Iron Mad' Wilkinson perfected his cannon-boring technique (patented 1774), enabling production of more accurate cannon for the American War. He was accused of also supplying France to aid the American cause.
Regimental museum of the 23rd Foot (Royal Welsh Fusiliers), which fought at Lexington, Bunker Hill, Brandywine, Germantown, Monmouth, and Yorktown — one of the most heavily engaged British regiments of the American war.
Europe's largest copper mine in the 1780s, supplying copper that sheathed the Royal Navy fleet during the American war. The Navy Board ordered the entire fleet coppered in 1779 -- a programme critical to British naval operations.