American Revolution, Major General Nathanael Greene

American Revolution, Major General Nathanael Greene Major General Nathanael Greene (August 7,  1742–June 19, 1786) was one of General George Washingtons most trusted subordinates during the American Revolution. Initially commanding Rhode Islands militia, he earned a commission in the Continental Army in June 1775 and within a year was leading large formations in Washingtons command. In 1780, he was given command of American forces in the South and conducted an effective campaign that greatly weakened British forces in the region and ultimately forced them back to Charleston, South Carolina. Fast Facts: Nathanael Greene Rank: Major GeneralService: Continental ArmyBorn: August 7, 1742 in Potowomut, Rhode IslandDied: June 19, 1786 in Mulberry Grove Plantation, GeorgiaParents: Nathanael and Mary GreeneSpouse: Catharine LittlefieldConflicts: American Revolution (1775–1783)Known For: Siege of Boston, Battle of Trenton, Battle of Monmouth, Battle of Guilford Court House, Battle of Eutaw Springs Early Life Nathanael Greene was born on August 7, 1742, in Potowomut, Rhode Island. He was the son of a Quaker farmer and businessman. Despite religious misgivings about formal education, the young Greene excelled in his studies and was able to convince his family to retain a tutor to teach him Latin and advanced mathematics. Guided by future Yale University president Ezra Stiles, Greene continued his academic progress. When his father died in 1770, he began to distance himself from the church and was elected to the Rhode Island General Assembly. This religious separation continued when he married the non-Quaker Catherine Littlefield in July 1774. The couple would ultimately have six children who survived infancy. American Revolution A supporter of the Patriot cause during the American Revolution, Greene assisted in the formation of a local militia near his home at Coventry, Rhode Island, in August 1774. Greenes participation in the units activities was limited due to a slight limp. Unable to march with the men, he became an avid student of military tactics and strategy. As such, Greene acquired a substantial library of military texts, and like fellow self-taught officer Henry Knox, worked to master the subject. His devotion to military affairs led to his expulsion from the Quakers. The following year, Greene was again elected to the General Assembly. In the wake of the Battle of Lexington and Concord, Greene was appointed as a brigadier general in the Rhode Island Army of Observation. In this capacity, he led the colonys troops to join in the siege of Boston. Becoming a General Recognized for his abilities, Greene was commissioned as a brigadier general in the Continental Army on June 22, 1775. A few weeks later, on July 4, he met General George Washington and the two became close friends. With the British evacuation of Boston in March 1776, Washington placed Greene in command of the city before dispatching him south to Long Island. Promoted to major general on August 9, he was given command of Continental forces on the island. After constructing fortifications in early August, he missed the disastrous defeat at the Battle of Long Island on the 27th due to a severe fever. Greene finally saw combat on September 16, when he commanded troops during the Battle of Harlem Heights. Engaged during the later part of the battle, his men helped push the British back. After he was given command of American forces in New Jersey, Greene launched an abortive attack on Staten Island on October 12. Moved to command Fort Washington (on Manhattan) later that month, he erred by encouraging Washington to hold the fort. Though Colonel Robert Magaw was ordered to defend the fort to the last, it fell on November 16, and more than 2,800 Americans were captured. Three days later, Fort Lee across the Hudson River was taken as well. Philadelphia Campaign Though Greene was blamed for the loss of both forts, Washington still had confidence in the Rhode Island general. After falling back across New Jersey, Greene led a wing of the army during the victory at the Battle of Trenton on December 26. A few days later, on January 3, he played a role at the Battle of Princeton. After entering winter quarters at Morristown, New Jersey, Greene spent part of 1777 lobbying the Continental Congress for supplies. On September 11, he commanded a division during the defeat at Brandywine, before leading one of the attack columns at Germantown on October 4. After moving to Valley Forge for the winter, Washington appointed Greene quartermaster general on March 2, 1778. Greene accepted on the condition that he be allowed to retain his combat command. Diving into his new responsibilities, he was frequently frustrated by Congress unwillingness to allocate supplies. After departing Valley Forge, the army fell upon the British near Monmouth Court House, New Jersey. In the resulting Battle of Monmouth, Greene led the right wing of the army and his men successfully repulsed heavy British assaults on their lines. Rhode Island That August, Greene was sent to Rhode Island with the Marquis de Lafayette to coordinate an offensive with French Admiral Comte dEstaing. This campaign came to a dismal end when American forces under Brigadier General John Sullivan were defeated on August 29. Returning to the main army in New Jersey, Greene led American forces to victory at the Battle of Springfield on June 23, 1780. Two months later, Greene resigned as quartermaster general, citing Congressional interference in army matters. On September 29, 1780, he presided over the court-martial that condemned spy Major John Andre to death. After American forces in the South suffered a serious defeat at the Battle of Camden, Congress asked Washington to select a new commander for the region to replace the disgraced Major General Horatio Gates. Going South Without hesitation, Washington appointed Greene to lead Continental forces in the South. Greene took command of his new army at Charlotte, North Carolina, on December 2, 1780. Facing a superior British force led by General Lord Charles Cornwallis, Greene sought to buy time to rebuild his battered army. He divided his men in two and gave command of one force to Brigadier General Daniel Morgan. The following month, Morgan defeated Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton at the Battle of Cowpens. Despite the victory, Greene and his commander still did not feel the army was ready to engage Cornwallis. After reuniting with Morgan, Greene continued a strategic retreat and crossed the Dan River on February 14, 1781. Due to flood waters on the river, Cornwallis elected to return south to North Carolina. After camping at Halifax Court House, Virginia, for a week, Greene was sufficiently reinforced to recross the river and begin shadowing Cornwallis. On March 15, the two armies met at the Battle of Guilford Court House. Though Greenes men were forced to retreat, they inflicted heavy casualties on Cornwallis army, compelling it to withdraw toward Wilmington, North Carolina. In the wake of the battle, Cornwallis decided to move north into Virginia. Greene decided not to pursue and instead moved south to reconquer the Carolinas. Despite a minor defeat at Hobkirks Hill on April 25, Greene succeeded in retaking the interior of South Carolina by mid-June 1781. After allowing his men to rest in the Santee Hills for six weeks, he resumed the campaign and won a strategic victory at Eutaw Springs on September 8. By the end of the campaign season, the British were forced back to Charleston, where they were contained by Greenes men. Greene remained outside the city until the wars end. Death With the conclusion of hostilities, Greene returned home to Rhode Island. For his service in the South, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia all voted him large grants of land. After being forced to sell much of his new land to pay off debts, Greene moved to Mulberry Grove, outside of Savannah, in 1785. He died on June 19, 1786, after suffering from heat stroke.

How Planning Your Blog Content Can Help You Get More Done

How Planning Your Blog Content Can Help You Get More Done I dont like planning out my blog content, she said. My friend and I were talking about editorial calendars and I, of course, was singing the praises of them. Id been using to plan my own blogs content and seeing great results. Why? I asked. I think content is better when it is spontaneous. More fresh, she said. When its planned out, its boring and dry. And I never end up actually writing the stuff on my calendar, which makes me feel bad. The Case For Doing More Blog Planning Before You Write via @JulieNeidlingerI could relate. Sort of. Most of my blogging existence has been one of writing at random. On a whim. When I felt like it. When the inspiration was flowing.  And it was also super sporadic, once every two weeks, and then three posts in one night. But I still felt that I needed to defend the idea of planning blog content ahead of time, before it was written, to my adamant friend. So is planning your blog content the answer to great content or its nemesis? If to plan or not to plan was a concept that was on trial, lets see how it would all pan out. The Case For Planning Your Blog Content In the case of to plan or not to plan, we have six witnesses for blog planning  defense: Inspiration can be used better. Systems have a chance to work. The rule of thirds means excellence. Rants and regrets dont exist. Research is better. Ideas are better fleshed-out. Strategy needs planned content to work. 1. Use your inspiration better. When that amazing inspiration hits, thats when you can get some serious blog planning done. The thing is, inspiration isnt always a regular friend. It often hits at inconvenient times and places (in the shower, or 2 a.m., or driving down the highway). Its wonderful when you get in the zone and the words fall out of your head into magical order, but most of the time, writing is an exercise that you practice to get better. Look at it pragmatically- you could use that wave of creative goodwill on just one post, or you could use it to brainstorm and write quick notes and ideas down for many posts. When your inspiration hits, you could write one blog post. Or use it to plan a dozen.When inspiration hits, brainstorm: Headlines Post ideas Content themes Series Ebook titles Email autoresponder courses As a writer often crunched for time and distracted from getting things done, Id rather get a lot of ideas lined up than just one post published. 2. A  chance to put a great  system to work for you. Writing systems are not magic bullets.  You can become so obsessed with finding the perfect system that you get nothing done and end up with no system at all. So no, a blog planning system isnt magic. But it is a way to shift into gear, get some momentum, and let the words flow easier. Systems are exactly like priming the pump. A system to plan your blog content isnt magic. But it can help you get more done.When you plan your blog content, you dont have to be afraid of not knowing what to say. Your system will help you. And, youll have time to properly use your system to achieve good final results because you planned and arent working in a rush. Here are two examples of writing systems that work great when youre planning ahead: The snowflake method for planning your blog content. This is a system novelists sometimes use. The idea is that you start small and build structure. The goal is to avoid major rewrites because you do the foundational work in such a way that the final structure falls into place. The snowflake method has writers start with a one-sentence summary of their book, then a paragraph to describe the plot. Then the characters are developed in a similar way, and so on down the line. While your planned content might not be a novel, a system that gets you to summarize and build from that summary to create a blog post could easily work. This type of system, where you start small and at the top of the pyramid, working down to the broader content, is best for detail-oriented people who like control. Julies four-step system for planning your blog content. Ive talked in detail about a four-step method I use to write blog posts. It starts wide and loose, unlike the snowflake system, allowing people who work best from inspiration or large ideas dump everything out on the page. Then it systematically helps you prune it back through editing and locating the excess. This type of system, where you start big and work from the bottom of the pyramid, working up to tighter content, is best for people who get large ideas first and then write them down to details. Or, for people who have a rush of inspiration and ideas and have to write them down before they lose them. 3. Time to perfect the final one-third. By planning your blog content, you have the chance to work on it, rework it, and finesse it. You have the time. Blog planning gives you the time to work, more than anything. And that means you can reach that final one-third. To simplify Tim Hursons idea in his book Think Better, we work in thirds. The first third is bad. The second third is better. The last third is the keeper. Thats the idea behind writing 25 headlines  to get one keeper, thats the idea of waiting until youve finished your blog post before writing the introduction. What you write initially is like rebar. Its basic, crude, rough. Just the start. Then you pour concrete or put up the drywall in your second round of work. Finally, you finish it out and add the final touches. Thats the final third, where you find the gold. Too many blog posts out there are rebar content. The initial idea, the bare-bones writing, the surface treatment. If they had had the time, they would have really been finished.  What does perfection in that final third involve? Time to identify lazy writing mistakes. Time to proofread and make edits. Time for other team members to complete the duties they have to do. When you plan your content, you get enough time to get past that first third into the good stuff. 4. No regrets for rants. With a long and storied history of ridiculousness, I am familiar with the insta-rant that you write and publish in a nanosecond and then spend the next few weeks putting out online fires. Rants and off-the cuff content can get you into trouble. Letting them sit as a draft for a day or two is the best option. But whats even better, particularly for a brand? Sticking to an editorial calendar and not relying on rants at all. When it comes to off-the-cuff content, rants frequently bubble to the top. Yikes. Spare yourself regret, avoid writing and publishing in the same fell swoop, and always stick to the plan no matter what youre angry or frustrated about in the moment. Spare yourself regret. Avoid writing and publishing in one fell swoop.5. Better research is possible. When you know what you have to write, you can research better. You can find better ideas using methods like the skyscraper technique. I know that having a plan in place and knowing what I will be writing about makes me more aware of what I could use in upcoming blog posts as Im reading and hopping around the Internet. This actually saves time in the long run. You cant do that when you dont plan. 6. A chance to use your organized ideas. Organizing ideas so that you can find and use them when you need to is a challenge. Much of the time, the reason people write in the moment is that they lack a system of storing that idea for a later time when they could write the content better. So they just toss it online so they dont lose it. When you plan your blog content, you can plug those ideas into your plan. Its one of my favorite things about , the ability to gather notes, research, links, conversations, and files right where Im planning. I dont have to feel the panic of writing now and hoping I can make it work in the first round. I can put it all together as time allows, and write later according to the plan. 7. You can create and implement strategy. Cant plan your blog content? You sure as heck wont be able to create a content strategy. Cant plan your content? You sure as heck wont be able to create a content strategy. How can you do any A/B testing if you never plan anything ahead of time? How can you pick out relevant patterns in your analytics? How can you attempt to make improvements to your content, your conversions- your anything- if you dont plan? No strategy, no direction, no budget. Planning ahead with your content goes hand-in-hand with planning your content marketing strategy as a whole. The Case Against Planning Your Blog Content Are there times when planning your blog content is detrimental? In the case of to plan or not to plan, lets have a look at the witnesses for the prosecution: You miss out on trends. Topics are not interesting anymore. Topics are now irrelevant. True inspiration is always better. Planning leads to procrastination. Planned content is dull. Are these legitimate witnesses or do they fall apart under scrutiny? Lets have a look. 1. Miss out on hot trends. You definitely cant know what the big trend is going to be a month or two ahead of it. That is true. But planning your blog content means you allow for flexibility when necessary. Your plan can absorb those last-minute trend blog posts if they are an important part of your niche. Trendy posts are the sprinkles on a cupcake- great to have, but you still need the cupcake or they are just lame sprinkles. The plan gives you the ability to sprinkle trending content on top. 2. Topics are no longer interesting. Sometimes planned topics arent as interesting to you when it comes time to write them, even if you thought they were a few weeks or months ago. This could lead to boring posts, lackluster writing, or missed deadlines as you put off writing the post. Well. Im sorry for your pain. Thats the business and work of writing. But if you simply cant bring yourself to write the content that you arent interested in anymorefine. Dont write it. Plan extra content ideas so you have the freedom to reject ideas. Give yourself some leeway as part of your plan. Guess what? This very blog post was planned more than  three months ago. When I opened up my editorial calendar to start my scheduled post, I looked at it and thought: Ugh. I have nothing to say about this. In that moment, I didnt particularly like planned content, either, because writing the plan was not very inspiring. So I reverted to my usual writing system, began the process, primed the word pump, and got the post written. And heres the big secret: What might seem like a boring post gets more interesting as you actually start writing it. Truth. What might seem like a boring post gets more interesting as you actually start writing it.3. Topics are no longer relevant. The topics you picked a month ago are not relevant or appropriate anymore. Again, fine. So what? Discard them, find something new, or tweak them so they fit. The scrap cookie dough left over after cutting out shapes doesnt make the cookies any less good. In the same way, the topics that cant be used dont make the planning any less beneficial. 4. There really are inspired moments to write. There truly are moments when you are more inspired to write. Yes. There are moments when the writing gods smile down on you and gift you with the golden words. So write. Use that. But dont make that your go-to system for creating content. They are horribly fickle gods, those jerks, and they are the patrons of blogs that have five fantastic posts spread out over six years. 5. Planning feeds into procrastination. Admittedly, excessive planning is one of the great procrastinators tools. Im quite fond of planning. Planning is exciting. It feels like youre getting things in order  while skipping out on the hard part of actually doing something.  So, if youre prone to procrastination, planning your blog content can be a way you make yourself feel better about not actually creating the content. But thats your problem with procrastination, not planning. Find topics that you want to write. Find a system that makes the start of content creation less formidable so you dont keep putting it off. Dont blame your blog planning. Figure out why you are procrastinating instead.