James Burnes, MSA SC 3520-17128

Details about James Burnes’ life prior to his military service are unknown, but it is possible that he came from either Prince George’s or Montgomery County, Maryland. Recruiters for each company usually focused on a specific geographic region, and the men that composed the Third Company mostly came from these counties.[1]

Burnes enlisted in the First Maryland Regiment on January 21, 1776 and served as a sergeant in Captain Barton Lucas’ Third Company.[2] John Hughes, a private in the Third Company, wrote in his pension that Burnes served as the second sergeant and that Peter Brown was the first sergeant.[3] Brown was promoted to ensign before the Battle of Brooklyn, and if Hughes’ recollections are correct, it is possible that Burnes was promoted to first sergeant in Brown’s place.

Fought on August 27, 1776, the Battle of Brooklyn was the first combat experience for the men of the First Maryland Regiment. Unfortunately, the battle resulted in a major tactical and strategic defeat for the Continental Army. The British Army under the command of General William Howe successfully outflanked the Americans and forced them to retreat to their defensive fortifications at Brooklyn Heights.[4]

Despite their inexperience, the men of the First Maryland Regiment fought very well throughout the battle. Towards the end of the engagement and without an avenue of retreat, the Marylanders charged the numerically superior British force. The assault resulted in high casualties among the regiment but slowed the British advance, and enabled the rest of the army to retreat to Brooklyn Heights and later withdraw to Manhattan. The First Maryland Regiment’s sacrifice allowed the Continental Army to escape capture, and earned the regiment the name “Maryland 400.”

The Third Company sustained high losses during the battle; out of a force of seventy four men, only twenty nine appear on a list of troop strength on September 27, 1776.[5] Only one officer from the company, Peter Brown (now an ensign), made it back to the safety of the defensive fortifications at Brooklyn Heights. Captain Lucas was sick and missed the battle and near destruction of his company, a fact that haunted him.

Burnes’ fate during and after the battle are unknown. The clerk of the company listed Burnes’ on a “List of Lucas’ Men who had Breeches,” but the date the clerk made this list is not documented.[6]

If Burnes survived the battle it is possible that he returned to Prince George’s or Montgomery County. A James Burnes received a commission as a second lieutenant in the Prince George’s County militia in 1778, but it is not possible to make a connection between the two men.[7] Obtaining an officer’s commission in the militia was largely due to having political and social connections, and it is unlikely that a non-commissioned officer such as Sergeant Burnes possessed the connections to gain an officer’s commission. Another James Burnes was listed as a private in the Montgomery County militia in July 1780.[8] While serving as an enlisted private seems like a more plausible scenario, it is not possible to make a connection between this man and Sergeant James Burnes of the Maryland 400.

[1] Mark Andrew Tacyn, “‘To the End:’ The First Maryland Regiment and the American Revolution” (PhD diss., University of Maryland College Park, 1999), 21.

[2] Muster Rolls and Other Records of Service of Maryland Troops in the American Revolution, Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 18, p. 9.

[3] John Hughes Pension Application, Revolutionary War Pension and Bounty-Land Warrant Application Files, NARA M804, S. 5,594, 17, from Fold3.com.

[4] Henry P. Johnston, The Campaign of 1776 Around New York and Brooklyn (Brooklyn: 1878, reprint, New York: Da Capo Press, 1971), 191.

[5] Revolutionary War Rolls, NARA M246, 92, from Fold3.com.

[6] “List of Lucas’ Men who had Breeches,” Maryland State Papers, Revolutionary Papers, Box 11, Folder 19, Number 4b [MSA S 997-11-23].

[7] S. Eugene Clements and F. Edward Wright, The Maryland Militia in the Revolutionary War (Silver Spring, MD: Family Line Publications, 1987), 58.

[8] Clements and Wright, 206.