Original subtitles

[music playing]

HW BRANDS: We persist in the face of the greatest adversity.

This is what we have done from the beginning.

Washington is outgunned, outmanned.

DAVARIAN BALDWIN: That willingness to bleed

is the spark that sets the fire.

There has not been a bigger challenge to our country

since its founding.

STANLEY MCCHRYSTAL: When our values are tested,

they get stronger.

FRANKLIN ROOSEVELT: Japan has therefore undertaken a surprise

offensive.

LEAH WRIGHT RIGUEUR: This is about transforming not just

the lives of African Americans, but the lives

of every American.

I have a dream.

NARRATOR: For more than three centuries,

America has faced adversity.

DOUG DOUDS: What we are able to do is get back up and press on.

NARRATOR: This is the story of the challenges that

helped shape a nation.

WOMAN: It gives you faith that if we did it before,

we can do it again.

[music playing]

[waves crashing]

NARRATOR: From the very beginning,

America is a nation shaped by adversity.

In 1620, a congregation of Puritan separatists fleeing

religious persecution in Holland and Britain

leave for the New World‐‐

102 men, women, and children, sailing over 3,000 miles

in a ship called the Mayflower.

The pilgrims were a very special breed of people.

Most of us have never met anyone with the kind

of fundamentalist fervor and utter conviction

that they were on a mission from God that the pilgrims had.

What happened here?

NARRATOR: But before they can fulfill that mission,

their faith will be tested.

Overcoming challenges is deeply American.

From the settlers who came here to an uncertain future

to the waves of immigrants who came here to build better

lives for themselves and their families,

there is a spirit of resilience and overcoming struggles

that has made America the country it is today.

MARK OPPENHEIMER: As they approached the shores

of America, they got blown off course

by a very, very bad storm.

They wanted to end up at the mouth of the Hudson

River, which is now present‐day New York City.

And instead, they ended up near present‐day Boston.

That wasn't a choice.

NARRATOR: They arrive at Plymouth Harbor, 600 miles

north of the nearest English settlement.

It's the beginning of a terrible winter.

During the time the pilgrims came to North America,

the world was in the second wave of what's known as the Little

Ice Age.

Temperatures were two or three degrees

below normal, which doesn't sound like that much,

but it was enough to tip the balance to make crops harder

to grow, winters longer.

ALAN TAYLOR: They're going to have to survive with whatever

limited amount of food that they can find in their new vicinity.

NARRATOR: The Pilgrims' maps show Native American villages

nearby, people they might be able to barter with.

But foraging parties find the settlements are abandoned.

When the pilgrims arrived, they arrive to what seemed like

a semi‐wilderness, a howling wilderness,

it was called at the time.

But they also noticed there were all kinds of villages that

were just empty.

NARRATOR: Human skulls litter the ground.

They figured out pretty quickly

that there had to have been people there

and that those people had probably died.

And they knew that this didn't bode well

for their own survival.

They didn't have houses.

They didn't have ovens built. So the Pilgrims spent that winter

of 1620, 1621 on their boat, waiting

for it to get warm enough for them to go on land

and build houses.

NARRATOR: Then, some of the Pilgrims start to get sick.

JAMES MEIGS: Ever since humans started coming together

in large groups, pandemics have been a problem‐‐

all kinds of diseases that thrive in conditions where

people are close together and the disease

has a way to spread from person to person.

ALAN TAYLOR: They're suffering from exposure.

They're suffering from scurvy.

There's vitamin C deficiency.

And they are suffering from diseases

that seem to be related to influenza in their symptoms.

They did not have a professional doctor with them.

NARRATOR: 26‐year‐old Edward Winslow

is one of the few Pilgrims who remains healthy.

Now, he steps forward to help lead.

Edward Winslow was a bit of an unusual person

among the Pilgrims.

He was not someone who was looking

for a hearty travel or to brave new paths and to clear forests.

He was not an adventurer by nature, from what we know.

He was somebody who was literate,

who had penmanship, knew his letters.

He was a bookish person.

NARRATOR: But his education means nothing here.

Instead, he's pitched into a battle for survival.

He does the work of three men, tending to sick,

building new houses, and earns the respect of the community,

as he overcomes his own loss.

It was very tragic what happened to Edward Winslow.

He came to the New World with his wife Elizabeth,

and she died in March, leaving him a widower.

Only 45 of 102 people who had survived the voyage

would end up surviving into May.

So that's half of the people who'd

become their entire world.

NARRATOR: In the middle of the crisis facing the pilgrims,

Winslow remarries.

Susanna White has been widowed and has two children.

It was probably a huge inspiration for people.

It probably helped them buck up and decide

to keep going, having just lost half their community

to a brutal winter.

NARRATOR: Finally, the outbreak of disease

ends, and the survivors bury the last victims.

They camouflaged the graves to hide their vulnerability

from the Native Americans living around them.

Everyone in this group is coping with grief, as well as

hunger and disease and anxiety about their relationship

with the Native peoples in the vicinity.

NARRATOR: Now, Myles Standish begins to earn his pay.

Myles Standish is a professional soldier.

But he is not a member of their church,

and so he is something of an outsider.

MARK OPPENHEIMER: He was basically hired muscle,

a mercenary, a hired gun.

But he was also a man of principle.

He had been paid to do a job.

He had been paid to take care of these people

and to make sure that they survived.

He probably felt a mix of both failure, but also resolve.

He couldn't save everybody, but he was going

to save as many as he could.

The Plymouth colonists have to be prepared for the possibility

of an attack.

MARK OPPENHEIMER: They knew they were going to meet people who

were already in the New World.

The question was what were those people going to be like?

NARRATOR: A local tribe is watching the Pilgrims,

the Pokanoket Wampanoag.

They've been keeping their distance because they, too,

are afraid.

The Wampanoags had just come through a decade from hell.

They had lost 90% of their population, we think,

to a disease that had lasted until just before the Pilgrims

arrived.

And they were in a constant state of low level conflict,

of war, really, with the nearby Narragansetts.

And the Wampanoag would have figured out fairly quickly

that these new settlers came with diseases to which they did

not have immunities and which were very, very threatening

to the Native population.

NARRATOR: Spring comes, and the Pilgrims

make their first attempts to cultivate the land,

but nothing will grow.

They're low on food.

The new threat is starvation.

[ominous music]

Edward!

Look over there!

Get up!

Get up!

Out the way.

Out the way.

Come on!

Myles Standish was going to be apprehensive.

He was going to be on his guard.

There was a history of violence between Europeans

and the native populations of North America,

and he was going to feel that it was his job to be

ready for whatever might come.

[intense music]

JAMES MEIGS: The spirit of independence

sparks a revolution.

The colonists made this decision to go to war with the greatest

military power on Earth.

NARRATOR: Outnumbered and outgunned,

they're inspired to fight.

George Washington is willing to throw out

the rulebook with regard to standard warfare.

NARRATOR: Pioneers head out to the front frontier.

DOUG DOUDS: Fertile grounds, rich forests, rivers‐‐

all of those things resided just over the next hill.

But the land is not unoccupied.

NARRATOR: And thousands more push West into the unknown.

They didn't really know what lay ahead.

When you went down this road, you weren't coming back.

NARRATOR: And as discord about slavery grows,

a new hero comes forward.

MARCIA CHATELAIN: Courage emerges in moments of crisis.

[music playing]

NARRATOR: March 16, 1621‐‐

a native chief named Samoset finally makes the first move.

Sent by the tribe, he approaches the colony

but still keeps his distance.

YOHURU WILLIAMS: The Native Americans view the Pilgrims

with great suspicion.

JAMES MEIGS: Even before the Pilgrims landed,

another group of American explorers

had kidnapped a group of Native Americans,

so there was a lot of bad blood.

The Wampanoag are led by a man named Massasoit.

And on the one hand, he feels like in a very strong position

because these newly arrived colonists are few.

But they do have some guns.

Massasoit's got to make a calculation.

Does he want this small, struggling settlement

to survive?

NARRATOR: Myles Standish is responsible for the colony's

survival.

He was hired for exactly this moment.

Standish, as a military man, he's

prone to seek military solutions to problems.

And so he is inclined to shoot first and ask questions later.

He's a very useful man if you are in a conflict,

but he is not so useful if you're involved in diplomacy.

NARRATOR: But Standish reads Samoset's body language.

His years of real‐world experience

have taught him to pick up what few others might see.

He takes a chance.

Welcome, Englishmen, welcome.

NARRATOR: Samoset it is sent by the tribal council,

not to annihilate the Pilgrims, but to broker an alliance.

He speaks some English, learned from earlier British traders.

You have to give credit not only to Myles Standish

for accepting at that moment that that Native American might

be coming in peace, but you have to also give credit

to the Wampanoag for sending out this English‐speaking envoy

to extend a hand, essentially, of friendship and cooperation.

NARRATOR: The two men agree to help one another

and sign a peace treaty.

YOHURU WILLIAMS: One could look at this really

as the first true moment of American diplomacy.

Here are the Natives and the settlers having a conversation

about shared interest, about boundaries, about territory,

and really, for the first time, trying to figure out how

they're going to live together.

NARRATOR: The key to this relationship

is Squanto, another English‐speaking Native

American who comes to live with the Pilgrims.

MARK OPPENHEIMER: Squanto had been kidnapped and taken

to Europe, where he had somehow ended up in London.

He's picked up a new language, and then he

gets to come home with all of this excitement,

brimming with a sense of adventure

and all of this knowledge that he can take back to his people.

NARRATOR: Squanto becomes the Pilgrims' translator,

and he brings them a gift.

The pilgrims could not have survived if they hadn't learned

how to grow corn from Squanto.

NARRATOR: Squanto shows them how to fertilize the soil

with fish.

Corn was a gift to the Pilgrims.

Its cultivation will spread and one day help feed the world.

JAMES MEIGS: Corn, or maize as it's technically known,

does not grow in Europe, and it wound up

being one of the most important crops in global history.

An acre of corn has two or three or more times the calories

of an acre of wheat or barley.

When people started growing corn in Europe

and other parts of the world, productivity went up,

and that meant they could support a bigger population.

And Europe's population started to grow.

NARRATOR: Trust and friendship grow between the Natives

and Pilgrims, cemented when Myles Standish and Edward

Winslow join the Wampanoag on a raid to rescue Squanto.

He's been kidnapped.

MARK OPPENHEIMER: There's this fellow, Corbitant,

who resents that Squanto has the ear both of the Pilgrims

and of the [inaudible],, the chief of the Wampanoags.

The raid as a real commando mission.

They get there at the crack of dawn,

when they think that nobody will be expecting them.

NARRATOR: Two enemy warriors are hurt in the assault,

but Squanto is rescued unharmed.

They rescue him.

They bring him back.

And war is averted, but it could have gone very, very badly.

NARRATOR: They celebrate the victory and the new Pilgrim

harvests together with the first Thanksgiving,

beginning 50 years of peace and cooperation.

In that moment, you can see the forging

through that connection of a new nation, one that's

going to be multicultural.

MARK OPPENHEIMER: It's really extraordinary

how in just a few months men like Edward Winslow

have become so comfortable with Squanto, and by extension,

with the Wampanoags.

MARK UPDEGROVE: The Pilgrims still resonate today

because they're emblematic of the American story.

The American story is about coming

to a new place for reinvention, for opportunity, for liberty.

NARRATOR: 150 years later, the descendants

of the first English settlers will battle their mother

country for independence.

ALAN TAYLOR: Britain has a very successful empire in North

America, but it's cost a lot of money.

So the British government says, well, let's

put new taxes and new regulations on those colonies.

Boston became a hotbed of resistance

to British regulations and taxation to the point

that the British government decided it had to send troops

in to occupy the town.

This is asking for trouble.

NARRATOR: A confrontation in the city center between a crowd

of angry Bostonians and armed Redcoats

plunges the colonies into all‐out war.

[music playing]

March 1770‐‐ Boston, Massachusetts

is an occupied city.

It's been two years since the British Army first arrived.

The Redcoats have orders to suppress any civil protest

against Britain's unpopular taxes.

The relationship between the occupying British troops

and the local civilians in Boston was a complex one.

There are plenty of Bostonians who are trying to do business

with these soldiers.

There are a surprising number of young women

who marry these soldiers.

But there are also many Bostonians

who don't want these soldiers around.

[yelling]

In March of 1770, a group of young Bostonians

start throwing stones and snowballs

at a group of British soldiers guarding a government building.

NARRATOR: Captain Thomas Preston and his men

are surrounded by a hostile crowd of over 400.

[yelling]

Five Americans die.

DOUG DOUDS: We don't call it the misunderstanding of Boston.

We call it the Boston Massacre.

[gunshot]

Sam Adams says the foundation of American independence

was laid during the Boston Massacre.

Because when people think about that British soldiers are

massacring colonists, this raised the ire

of the rest of the colonists all across the other 13 colonies

as well.

Let's go.

NARRATOR: Patriots in the city, men like Paul Revere,

seize the moment.

They use it to win ordinary people across the colonies

to the cause of independence.

ALAN TAYLOR: Paul Revere was an accomplished silversmith

and engraver, and he engraved a very celebrated image

of the Boston Massacre, depicting the British soldiers

as quite ruthless and, indeed, seeming

to enjoy the slaughter of well‐dressed civilians.

NARRATOR: Colonial discontent grows.

There are riots and protests, like the Boston Tea Party,

over new taxes.

342 chests of tea end up in the harbor.

ALAN TAYLOR: A lot of people just wanted to hang back,

contend their own farms or their own shops.

And then, other Americans wanted to support the rule of Britain

because, on balance, the rule of Britain had been good to them.

Of course they didn't like the taxes or the regulations,

but they enjoyed prosperity most of the time.

NARRATOR: The colonies' loyalties are divided.

At the First Continental Congress in September 1774,

delegates search for a compromise.

HW BRANDS: Some of the Americans,

like Benjamin Franklin, proposed something like the union

between Scotland and England for America and Britain.

If the British had been far‐sighted enough

to accept a proposal or something like that,

the history of the American colonies and the British empire

would have been entirely different.

NARRATOR: Instead of compromise, the Congress

votes to boycott British goods and sends a letter

to King George, demanding an end to the taxes.

Their demands are rejected.

In 1775, Britain declares Massachusetts

to be in a state of rebellion and blockades the colony.

Both sides begin stockpiling weapons.

CARLOS WATSON: I think the British, having built

a global empire, really underestimated

this portion of the empire, namely the American colonists

here and were quite hesitant to engage in real negotiation.

You know, it's interesting.

Whenever you're in power, you probably

think that you'll be that way forever.

Certainly, the British took that approach

against the American upstarts.

NARRATOR: April 19, 1775‐‐

700 Redcoats march to the small town of Lexington

to find and seize a suspected cache of weapons.

They get to Lexington, and to their surprise,

there are people with arms waiting for them.

These are not professional soldiers.

These are common farmers and shopkeepers.

NARRATOR: Among them, men like John Parker, father of seven,

a farmer.

A quarter of these men are his direct relations.

Stand your ground.

No farm was fired upon.

But if we mean to have war, let it begin here.

NARRATOR: Opposite them stands the most powerful army

in the world.

The men are outnumbered more than five to one,

but they refuse to budge.

CARLOS WATSON: I think for many of us,

we've heard history as kind of the so‐called great man story,

whether it was a George Washington or Martin Luther

King, Jr., who ultimately has helped drive history

and turned the tide of history.

But in reality, it's been a great groundswell

of everyday people, whether it was Lexington or Concord

in the Revolutionary War, or whether, later on, it

was Rosa Parks in the Montgomery bus boycott.

ALAN TAYLOR: Somebody fired.

[gunshot]

We don't know who.

Take aim.

But when the firing begins‐‐

[horse whinnies]

Fire!

[gunshots]

‐‐the British are much better trained soldiers, better armed.

NARRATOR: The Redcoats kill eight.

They are the first casualties of the American Revolutionary War.

Among the injured is an enslaved African American,

Prince Eastabrook.

DAVARIAN BALDWIN: In some ways, it's

ironic that Prince Eastabrook is one of the first casualties

of the revolutionary cause at Lexington.

Here is someone who stands beside his own enslaver.

And yet, he is there also fighting for the independence

of these 13 colonies.

[gunfire]

[horse whinnies]

[hollering]

NARRATOR: The redcoats believe they have won the day.

Half of the battalion is ordered to march six miles onto Concord

to search for more weapons.

ALAN TAYLOR: And there, they face

much more formidable and numerous resistance.

And now, there are hundreds, indeed,

thousands of New England men coming from as far away

as New Hampshire and Rhode Island‐‐

Halt.

ALAN TAYLOR: ‐‐who have placed themselves behind stone walls,

behind trees, in houses, and sniping away at the retreating

British force, taking a steady toll of casualties.

This British force, in fact, was lucky to make it

all the way back to Boston.

These militia men decide they're not going to go home.

Instead, they're going to camp out around Boston

and make sure that the British troops don't come out again.

And so what had started out as a localized

firefight in Lexington has now become a war.

NARRATOR: To take on the most powerful army in the world,

the colonists will need a strong commander, someone who can

face desperate odds and win.

It's rare in history that you find someone who is really

an indispensable individual.

NARRATOR: The 13 American colonies

are on the verge of war with Britain,

and they are not prepared.

JAMES MEIGS: It's hard to appreciate today

how overwhelmingly powerful and sophisticated

the British Navy and the British military were.

They had the best ships, the best supplies, the best trained

troops, the best weapons.

The group that would become the Americans, the colonists,

didn't have any of that, and yet they

made this either brave or foolhardy decision

to go to war with the greatest military power on Earth.

[serious music]

NARRATOR: At the Second Continental Congress

in Philadelphia, 56 colonial delegates

signed the Declaration of Independence.

It's a clear act of treason.

DOUG DOUDS: The threat of them hanging was incredibly real,

which is why somebody like Ben Franklin

ultimately says we must all hang together,

or we will all hang separately.

This was a real threat, not a rhetorical one.

NARRATOR: They will need the colonial public behind them.

ALAN TAYLOR: No revolution can succeed without popular support

at a pretty high level of commitment

because you're asking people to overthrow an existing

form of government, to take a leap of faith

that some new government will be better.

NARRATOR: The Declaration of Independence

becomes a recruiting tool.

It is reprinted, distributed widely, read aloud.

YOHURU WILLIAMS: Americans tend to frame their defense

of liberty as the driving force which

helps to define our history.

And we see the foundations for that in the American Revolution

because here are these colonists willing to lay down

their lives, facing a foreign invader once considered

to be their countrymen.

NARRATOR: The liberty of all Americans

will be fought for in the centuries that follow.

The message put forward by the Founding Fathers, this message

of freedom, I think it was critical for those fighting

for their independence in the 13 colonies.

It became a beacon of hope, something to strive forward.

NARRATOR: A year before the Declaration is signed,

Congress begins the process of selecting a commander who

can lead the Continental Army against the British.

The list of suitable candidates is short‐‐

John Hancock and George Washington.

It's a counterfactual that John Hancock might become

the commander in chief over George Washington.

He had military experience.

He was well respected.

Certainly, his position within the Continental Congress

and his role within that reflects the respect

that many of the folks felt for him.

NARRATOR: But Hancock has a weakness.

DOUG DOUDS: John Hancock's signature on the Declaration

of Independence tells us multiple things

about John Hancock.

One‐‐ John Hancock is very confident about John Hancock.

He was one willing to put his name at the top of the list.

It's a fascinating display of courage, perhaps arrogance.

NARRATOR: Washington is very different‐‐

wealthy, elite.

In the French and Indian War, George Washington

fought on the British side.

Now, he wants to lead the Continental Army against them.

He very easily could have sat out the war.

In fact, Washington was one of the unlikeliest of rebels.

Things were going very well for George Washington.

Under other circumstances, he should have been a loyalist,

but he chose the harder route of independence.

NARRATOR: Washington has the battlefield experience

Hancock lacks.

But some in Congress question his record.

ALAN TAYLOR: Washington had taken his lumps.

He had suffered some defeats.

His first independent command in 1754

had gone so badly that he had to surrender to the French.

The next year, he is in a subordinate position

in a larger British land force that

plunges into a deadly ambush and will kill the British commander

and will kill most of the other British field officers.

NARRATOR: Washington takes command of the retreating

British troops.

Though 456 men die in the ambush,

he leads over 100 to safety.

Washington proves to be a very skilled commander in retreat.

He'd learned some very important lessons,

and he had proven himself a very calm head in the midst of very

dangerous circumstances.

NARRATOR: So George Washington is appointed commander in chief

of the Continental Army on June 19, 1775.

[intense music]

Just over a year later, the largest British Naval task

force ever assembled converges on New York.

Each ship of the line costs as much as a modern‐day aircraft

carrier.

Washington orders his troops to dig in on Long Island.

MARK UPDEGROVE: He wasn't the kind

of European military leader who would stand back and watch

the men at the front lines and have orders carried to them.

He stood with the men on the front lines.

He was one of them.

STANLEY MCCHRYSTAL: People need to be led not directed they

need to follow an inspirational, charismatic, courageous leader.

Second, when you're not at the front,

you really can't have that feel for what's going on.

NARRATOR: Washington has 10,000 men to fend off

the invasion, most untested.

He is going to face the, arguably, best army on Earth,

and certainly the best navy on Earth in fighting England.

This revolution is far from secure.

In fact, it's a little bit in doubt at this point about

whether or not we're going to make it

because this is the crisis that must be overcome.

[explosion]

[music playing]

NARRATOR: 14 months after Washington becomes commander

in chief, his men confront the British in battle.

First they endure a heavy naval bombardment.

Then, 32,000 British redcoats assault Washington's badly

outnumbered army.

And you've got the world's greatest empire, the world's

largest armada, and the world's largest army have all

arrived on your doorstep, and they are coming to crushing.

DOUG DOUDS: The battle of Long Island for George Washington

is a really tough one.

His defensive line collapses.

It's almost a disaster.

[explosion]

NARRATOR: In a daring move to save his men,

Washington fools the British with his retreat.

In the midst of crisis, he keeps his wits about him,

and he is able to go ahead and rescue his soldiers

through the night by getting them off the island.

He will gather all of the rafts, barges all around New York.

And that night in a fog, they will slip back

across the river to Manhattan.

He doesn't win the battle, but he doesn't lose his army

either.

NARRATOR: But the British have begun to burn New York.

Many Continental soldiers have families trapped in the city.

The defeat tests the resolve of Washington's men.

DOUG DOUDS: Washington's credibility

as a general is threatened.

That's going to start a 12‐week period where he largely gives

up the better portions of three states

and loses somewhere between 60% and 90% of his army by the time

he stops on the other side of the Delaware.

ALAN TAYLOR: On the order of about 3,000 men are left.

They're in rags.

They're hungry.

Morale is rock bottom.

LEON PANETTA: I think Washington understood, particularly

after his defeat in New York, that he had to show them

that they could achieve military victory,

that they could win against this better trained and better

equipped enemy that they were confronting.

NARRATOR: Washington gets his chance on December 25, 1776.

He leads 2,400 men across the Delaware River

in a daring night raid.

[marching]

[cannons exploding]

They assault the enemy garrison at Trenton,

capturing over 900 prisoners and losing just two men.

George Washington is the secret ingredient

to the American military victory during the American Revolution,

primarily because he's willing to throw out

the rulebook with regard to standard warfare.

His innovation is borne of the fact

that he's willing to fail and fail big.

And in so doing, he gives the Continental Army

a distinct advantage, one that the British could not

have foreseen.

NARRATOR: Washington's bold assault at Trenton

marks a shift in Continental Army tactics.

Aggressive commanders are promoted, including

Daniel Morgan, a man Washington knows from their service

in the Virginia militia.

Morgan is made colonel of an elite military unit.

Some leaders are borne of the moment,

and Daniel Morgan might very well be such a leader.

What the colonists really fought was a guerilla war.

And Morgan is the architect of that war‐‐

encouraging sniping, not engaging

in standard military tactics.

NARRATOR: Morgan commands around 500 men, all sharpshooters

raised on the frontier and skilled in bush craft.

They're equipped with rifles, a weapon

first brought to the colonies by German immigrants.

Most guns at the time of the Revolutionary War

were muskets, accurate to something like 40 yards.

The long rifle that some Americans used

was accurate at a range of perhaps 100 yards,

even 200 yards in some cases in the hands of a trained

sharpshooter.

NARRATOR: Morgan is controversial.

His men target British officers.

DOUG DOUDS: Most famously, we have the scenario

during the Battle of Saratoga, where General Fraser,

a British officer, is targeted.

NARRATOR: Tim Murphy is Morgan's most accurate shooter.

One of thousands of men who suffered at the Battle of Long

Island, Murphy now has the chance

to take down a British general and give his fellow patriots

an advantage.

YOHURU WILLIAMS: One of the reasons

that this is so destabilizing to the British army

is that they see the attacks on officers as uncivilized.

This is not the way that civilized nations conduct

warfare.

[gunfire]

NARRATOR: With officers down, the British

lose 1,000 men at Saratoga, twice as many as Washington.

The British commander General Burgoyne surrenders.

YOHURU WILLIAMS: The reality is that the colonists see this

as a struggle for their very existence, for their liberty,

and so anything at that point was on the table.

NARRATOR: But 280 miles away, the colonial army

is in trouble.

Washington is defeated at Philadelphia,

and his army retreats to a winter camp at Valley Forge.

It's the low point of the war.

ALAN TAYLOR: The British had attacked Philadelphia

and driven Washington's army into rural Pennsylvania

to a place called Valley Forge, where Washington is going to,

again, try to recover from defeat, rebuild his army.

But he is going to do so without enough food,

without pay for his soldiers, without enough clothing,

and with very poor housing.

So he's got this ragged army.

They look like beggars.

NARRATOR: Washington has nothing with which to feed or clothe

his men.

Hundreds freeze to death.

Others die from disease.

One of the scourges of warfare in the 18th century

was disease.

Soldiers were brought together in close proximity.

This was an era when smallpox swept

through the civilized world on a regular basis.

And the way to avoid smallpox was for everybody to scatter.

But being in a military camp requires exactly the opposite.

Washington had smallpox as a young man,

and he knows that smallpox would be the one disease that

could largely destroy his army.

NARRATOR: In just six weeks, 2,000 men die.

Inoculation might stop the disease,

but it's dangerous and unpredictable.

JAMES MEIGS: Some people who were inoculated got very sick

and didn't survive.

Some people think even as many as 3%.

Inoculation meant taking the real virus from a person

or an animal and infecting your human patient with that virus,

but in a very, very low quantity.

So you get maybe a little bit sick for a few days,

and then you've got the antibodies, and you're safe.

You're inoculated.

NARRATOR: Washington permits inoculation to go ahead.

Dozens of his men die, but thousands are saved.

DOUG DOUDS: I think what we find here is one of Washington's

leadership traits of he is able to look very clearly at what

the problem is.

If the goal is independence, then the army

must stay in the field.

If the army is to stay in the field,

then the disease is a threat, so he takes action on his own.

Washington hires a maverick general to rebuild his army.

MARK UPDEGROVE: His men need discipline.

They need organization.

They need training.

NARRATOR: The man Washington selects is Prussian General

Baron von Steuben.

DOUG DOUDS: I would argue the birth of the United States Army

occurs at Valley Forge in part because of von Steuben's

efforts.

NARRATOR: In 1778, George Washington's Continental Army

is camped at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania‐‐

thousands strong, but it's a disorganized rabble.

Washington has taken a calculated risk

and engaged maverick Prussian General Baron von

Steuben to transform his men.

STANLEY MCCHRYSTAL: General Washington

wanted someone very proficient to professionalize

the Continental Army.

But von Steuben, who was sort of an untypical character,

cursed at the troops.

It was dangerous because he could have produced

a resistance‐type reaction to him from the soldiers.

But one of Washington's greatest talents

is he can size up the ability of other individuals very quickly,

and he can figure out how to use them well.

Now, von Steuben is the right man at the right time.

He'd been a captain.

The Prussian army was used to winning most of its battles

against superior numbers because of superior discipline.

von Steuben understands this military tradition,

and this is the kind of officer Washington needs.

NARRATOR: von Steuben goes right to work.

ALAN TAYLOR: When von Steuben gets there,

this is a military camp, and it's much more chaotic

than it used to dealing with.

It's a filthy camp, undisciplined soldiers,

cold, exposure, inadequate food, ragged clothing.

Morale is rock bottom.

Then he starts to rearrange things so

that there would be better sanitation

and so these soldiers will take as much pride in their units

and themselves as is possible in their ragged condition.

NARRATOR: He introduces real military training

and drills his men in hand‐to‐hand combat.

STANLEY MCCHRYSTAL: The soldiers also understood

that von Steuben bought something they didn't have‐‐

the ability to mold them into an army that

could stand on the battlefield against the British regulars.

NARRATOR: In just a few months, Washington's strategy pays off.

His men are ready to fight.

[music playing]

But the Continental Army still has a serious weakness.

ALAN TAYLOR: Washington is short on resources.

His army's outgunned and outmanned almost all the time.

And so he more than any other commander

needs to know where he's vulnerable.

Where was his enemy likely to strike, in what numbers,

with what sort of troops?

NARRATOR: To gain the advantage Washington innovates

with a new tactic.

STANLEY MCCHRYSTAL: One of the things

that's sometimes surprising about George Washington is

that he was so good at intelligence, part of which

was spy work.

JAMES MEIGS: One thing he recognized is that wars are won

on information.

So he was very enthusiastic about using spies.

Washington had one particular spy network

called Culper's Gang.

NARRATOR: These special agents operate

inside British‐occupied territory.

Every one of them knows the risks.

The penalty for spying was hanging.

You didn't even get a trial.

You just got hanged.

They must have been passionately devoted to the cause

of independence, but also deeply trusting of Washington himself.

You don't go sending secret messages that are going to get

you hanged to somebody if you don't trust that he is

both highly competent and highly dependable

in terms of keeping your secrets.

NARRATOR: In July 1780, Robert Townsend

overhears a British plan to attack the French fleet

supplying the Continental Army in New England.

JAMES MEIGS: If the British meet it and wipe it out,

that might have been the end of the game

for Washington and the entire revolutionary cause.

NARRATOR: Townsend uses elaborate spy craft

to alert Washington to the danger.

JAMES MEIGS: Townsend, of course,

was taking enormous risks.

One way he protected himself was using invisible ink.

This was actually a technique recommended by Washington

himself.

The Culper Spy Ring used a lot of techniques

that we think of as being part of Cold War spying.

They used a technique called a dead drop, where you don't

necessarily need to hand your incriminating message from one

spy to another.

You leave it in a certain spot, and then spy number two

comes along and picks it up.

And they were able to convey information

about when that handoff was ready by the way clothes were

arranged on a particular conspirator's clothesline.

NARRATOR: The warning reaches Washington

just as the British were about to set

sail to launch their attack.

Washington believes that if they think their base is in danger,

they might call off the operation,

so Washington moves his troops across the Hudson to Manhattan.

It works.

The British fleet remains at anchor,

and the French continue to provide vital supplies

to the Continental Army in Rhode Island.

Over the next year, Washington's forces

are able to win several important battles.

By the fall of 1781, part of the British Army

is under siege in Yorktown, Virginia.

[yelling]

On the evening of October 14, Washington's Continental Army

and his French allies launch what will be the final attack

of the Revolutionary War.

The exhausted British Army surrenders.

General Washington's strategic brilliance and innovation

confirms his reputation as one of the nation's

great military leaders.

STANLEY MCCHRYSTAL: When I think of George Washington‐‐

they talked about the indispensable man.

I think that's as true as any description has ever

been of any single American.

General Washington was a military leader, but more,

he became a symbol.

I think he defined more things about American society

probably than any of the other of the Founding Fathers.

NARRATOR: Even before victory is secure,

pioneers are heading West.

One of them blazes a new trail across the Appalachian

Mountains into the Kentucky wilderness.

In March 1775, Daniel Boone, a fur trapper

from North Carolina, leads an expedition

through the Appalachian Mountains

to a wilderness untouched by European settlers.

Pioneers in the New World viewed the land

beyond the mountains as a land of opportunity.

It was ripe.

It was fertile grounds, rich forests, fertile fields,

mineral resources, rivers.

The opportunity to change your position,

to change your economic status, to own land,

all of those things resided just over the next hill

beyond the next ridge line.

NARRATOR: It's a 200‐mile trek through dense forest

to an area called the Kentucky Territory.

Daniel Boone in 1775 is a logical choice to lead this.

He had experience out there.

He has a militia officer.

He's the quintessential frontiersman.

He's tall.

He's rugged.

He's a hunter.

He's a land speculator.

He's a surveyor.

He's a militia officer.

NARRATOR: For two weeks, Boone and his men cut the trail west.

Come, on, go.

NARRATOR: But as they near their destination,

they realize they're being followed by the Shawnee.

This is their land.

JAMES MEIGS: Conflict between European Americans

and Native Americans was inevitable from the start.

But it became particularly acute when settlers began

to move through the Appalachians into lands where previously

the Native tribes had not had to contend with more

than the occasional trapper or hunter.

Now, all of a sudden, people were coming in.

They were cutting down trees.

They were building roads.

NARRATOR: Daniel Boone has run into the Shawnee before.

Daniel Boone had been there not but two years ago.

He had tried to lead a group of 50 people

out there, when they were attacked.

In fact, one of his sons is captured and tortured.

This forces him to turn back.

But that experience had given him a resilience.

The idea that Daniel Boone will return in 1775

speaks volumes about his commitment to a vision

that he will grow the West.

NARRATOR: On March 25, Boone's party

is only 15 miles from their final destination

when the Shawnee attack.

[explosion]

One of Boone's right‐hand men, Captain Twitty,

is shot in both knees and dies.

Go, go, go.

[yelling]

[screams]

His servant is killed too.

Three others are injured.

[bird tweeting]

But somehow, Daniel Boone is able to go ahead and take

this moment and say, no, no, this

isn't the time to turn around.

It is the time to double down and press on.

Daniel Boone, who has learned from the past‐‐

they press on.

NARRATOR: On April 1, 1775, Boone and his company

reach Kentucky.

By summertime, they built a settlement

with 26 cabins and 4 block houses.

They name it Boonesborough.

Within a year, 200 more settlers arrive.

Just 15 years later, the population of Kentucky

is 77,000.

MARCIA CHATELAIN: Because of Daniel Boone and his peers'

desire to see the limits of the land,

we today have an incredibly diverse geography in the United

States.

But it all came at a very high price

when we think about the loss of life that occurred as a result

of westward expansion.

NARRATOR: By 1800, 45,000 more settlers

have moved on to another region of the frontier called

the Northwest Territory.

These lands are already home to thousands of Native Americans.

[dark music]

YOHURU WILLIAMS: In the early 1800s,

Indigenous Americans recognize just what a lethal force

the colonists represent.

They also recognize the need to fight

to preserve their heritage, their lives, and their culture.

NARRATOR: A Shawnee chief named Tecumseh comes forward

to lead the Native resistance.

YOHURU WILLIAMS: At every point in his life,

Tecumseh had witnessed the brutality, the trickery

of Europeans toward Native peoples.

And more than perhaps any other in that moment,

he recognizes that if there's going

to be a defense of Indigenous peoples, of Native cultures,

they're going to have to band together.

But he's got to get them to put away their petty rivalries

and factions and to buy into a collective vision of what they

can be.

NARRATOR: Tecumseh calls on the tribes

to unite and defend their land.

[non‐english speech]

YOHURU WILLIAMS: Tecumseh is a incredible speaker, someone who

is able to conjure imagery that inspires Native peoples

not only to recognize their shared heritage and culture,

but also to inspire them to be willing to give

their very lives to fight against the invaders who are

rapidly overtaking their territory.

NARRATOR: Slowly, Tecumseh's diplomacy

binds the tribes together in a broad Native alliance.

Over the next three years, his armed coalition

slows the movement of Western pioneers.

And in the War of 1812 Tecumseh's

force allies with the British against the Americans.

August 5, 12 miles from modern Detroit‐‐

200 US troops march to Fort Detroit

to reinforce the strategically important outpost.

Tecumseh and 24 of his warriors set an ambush for them.

Tecumseh's plan is to fool the Americans.

[vocalizing]

YOHURU WILLIAMS: And so he's able to get his soldiers to do

things like kicking up dust or making noises to augment

in the imagination of the American regulars

the size of his army.

And in so doing, he's very successful in creating a fear

about this overwhelming fighting force that

exists in the shadows.

NARRATOR: Now, Tecumseh and his men march on Fort Detroit

and take it without bloodshed.

Please.

[non‐english speech]

NARRATOR: And he orders his victorious band of men

to treat the soldiers humanely as prisoners of war.

ALAN TAYLOR: This helped to underline Tecumseh's message,

which is that the Native peoples were fighting with a great deal

of dignity, and they were going to contradict their stereotype

as being savages in combat.

NARRATOR: But it's Tecumseh's last great victory.

[sad music]

A year later, he's killed in battle by an American colonel.

Without him, the tribal alliance collapses.

DAVARIAN BALDWIN: Tecumseh's death

represents a significant level of decline

in Native American resistance in the Ohio River Valley,

and also in most Eastern and Southern states.

From that point on, we find the migration, the forced removal

of Native Americans all the way west of the Mississippi River.

[sad music]

NARRATOR: As Native Americans are pushed out,

the lands of the Ohio River country

open up to pioneer settlement.

By 1820, the population of Ohio has doubled to 580,000.

Indiana's population leaps from 24,000 to almost 150,000.

The land is rich in minerals and timber,

and the soil will grow any crop.

But transporting it to sell in Eastern markets

is arduous, expensive, and slow.

So while the cities of the East are booming,

the Western frontier is left behind.

JAMES MEIGS: The answer was a canal.

If you think about the load that a donkey can carry

or an ox pulling a cart can carry,

it is a tiny amount of goods for a huge amount of effort.

But if you put that same grain into a flat boat,

it can carry thousands of bushels of grain

with very little effort.

NARRATOR: DeWitt Clinton is the governor of New York state.

He has a big idea‐‐

a canal to move the wealth of the Western frontier

to the cities of the East.

It will connect lake Erie with the Hudson River.

The cost‐‐ $7 million.

In 1817, he gets approval to begin construction.

But there are problems.

it's 363 miles between Buffalo, New York and Albany,

and there's an elevation change of over 600 feet.

It's a very complex, massive engineering project.

Nothing like this had ever been done anywhere in the world.

NARRATOR: Dubbed Clinton's Ditch,

construction of the canal encounters dense forests,

brutal conditions, and 60‐foot walls of limestone.

1817‐‐ New York Governor DeWitt Clinton

is spearheading the construction of a 360‐mile canal

from Lake Erie to the Hudson River.

When complete, merchants will be able to move their goods

from Detroit to New York City five times faster than before.

The canal will reduce their transportation costs by 90%,

and the Western frontier will connect directly

to the prosperous Eastern seaboard for the first time.

But Clinton has no experience with construction,

and no canal has ever been built on this scale.

There is no school for engineers in the whole of the United

States.

His appointment of Benjamin Wright as chief canal engineer

is on a hunch.

Nobody had ever worked on a project of this scale

before, and certainly not Benjamin Wright.

Benjamin Wright is a self‐educated land surveyor

and engineer.

He doesn't really have any professional training.

So you wouldn't pick him out and say

this is a guy who is going to conduct

the most massive engineering project in American history.

NARRATOR: But Clinton sees potential in Wright.

He looks at his ambition.

He looks that he shares a common vision.

I think he sees a little of himself in there.

And because of that, he empowers Wright to fulfill this project

that he has envisioned.

NARRATOR: Together, Clinton and Wright

harness a new technology.

DOUG DOUDS: In the process of building the canal,

an invention is developed, a breakthrough product‐‐

waterproof cement.

It allows them to go ahead and be much more flexible in how

they're going to build this.

It will allow them to build with speed that was heretofore

unforeseen.

NARRATOR: They get off to a slow start.

Having only constructed 15 miles of the Erie Canal

after two years, Governor Clinton takes all kinds of flak

for not having made progress.

Will it ever get done?

Is the vision even possible?

But he sticks to his guns.

The foundational things that have been done in building

those first 15 miles are transferable

exponentially to the building of the rest, and so he presses on.

NARRATOR: Their progress is hampered by arduous conditions.

By one estimate, perhaps 1,000 workers lost their lives

on the project.

There were landslides.

They were working with rocks, dangerous animals.

[explosion]

NARRATOR: So Clinton tries something else.

ALAN TAYLOR: He actually encourages an increased flow

of immigrants, primarily from Ireland, who would provide

the cheap but able labor that would help to build this canal.

So it is the willingness to think out ahead of the curve,

using immigration policy to attract more people, that makes

DeWitt Clinton a truly accomplished leader.

NARRATOR: By 1823, 3,000 Irish laborers

are working on Clinton's Erie Canal,

joining others to dig 300 miles of channel

across harsh terrain.

30 miles from lake Erie, they hit a 60‐foot wall

of limestone.

They use a dangerous explosive called black powder

to blow their way through it.

[explosion]

JAMES MEIGS: This was before the days of TNT

and other explosives that allow you

to blast with some precision.

They would stuff black powder in a hole,

and blow it off, and hope for the best.

When people work in dangerous environments,

they become overconfident sometimes.

And sometimes, workers would just hold a shovel up

in front of their head when the blast was about to come in case

any flying rocks came their way.

NARRATOR: In 1825, the Erie Canal is complete,

and the impact is immediate.

Once the Erie Canal opened, the frontier

began to stop being a frontier.

It started to be more connected to the more civilized,

developed parts of the United States.

NARRATOR: Within 30 years, Clinton's canal

is carrying 62% of all US trade.

Timber, minerals, and grain flow to the East

in less than six days, five times faster than before.

Finished goods, like textiles and tools,

flow back West to the frontier.

People travel on the canal too.

By 1840, the population of Michigan

has grown from about 8,000 to 60,000.

By 1840, vast regions of the Midwest are settled and farmed.

The frontier has moved much farther West.

In 1841, the first wagon trains start a 2,000 mile epic journey

to the West Coast on the Oregon Trail.

[horse whinnies]

[screams]

By 1840, the first organized groups of pioneers

are starting West along the Oregon Trail.

The trail is 2,000 miles of dirt track from Independence,

Missouri to Oregon City.

The lure of the West is free land for anyone

who can claim it.

In the East in the 1840s, there

is a great deal of interest in the West Coast.

There are stories coming back from California and Oregon

that the land there was especially fertile

and the climate was much more temperate than in the East,

and so you'd have longer growing seasons.

NARRATOR: Between 1840 and 1870, 400,000 people

will take to the trail in search of a better life.

As many as 20,000 of them die.

When you went down this road, you weren't coming back.

So you were setting off for a new life in a land you knew

nothing about, knowing that you were saying

goodbye to your loved ones for the last time.

So they were really heading into the unknown.

If there's a single character trait that describes most

of the emigrants to the West, it was that they

had a capacity for optimism.

They believed that their life situation could improve if they

went West.

NARRATOR: Lucinda Brown is a pioneer.

She and her husband Elias, with their three young children,

leave for a new life in Oregon.

This is a journey that's going to take multiple months.

The people who are making this journey,

they've got to be tough.

This is not for the faint hearted.

NARRATOR: They hear news of a group of some pioneers

who left their homes in Missouri the previous May.

Five months into their journey, the Donner Party was trapped,

snowbound in the Sierra Nevada Mountains.

Stranded and starving, they were forced to eat their dead.

MARCIA CHATELAIN: The circulation of the stories

of the Donner Party really helps people understand

how risky this choice is.

And the fact that they do it anyway

shows that they were trying to imagine

a different set of circumstances for themselves

and their families.

NARRATOR: After three months on the road, Lucinda Brown's

husband Elias comes down with a bad fever.

Come on.

Dear Lord, receive our lives into Heaven,

and guide and protect us on this trail.

Amen.

MARCIA CHATELAIN: After her husband dies,

she has a decision to make.

Does she turn around and return home, where she at least knows

that she has community members and perhaps family to help her?

Or does she continue the family's goal of establishing

a new life out West?

And it is incredible to imagine a woman in her position

in that time feeling confident enough and strong enough

to journey forward.

NARRATOR: In early fall, they reach the Cascade Mountains.

The hardest part of the Oregon Trail

comes toward the end when the trail goes through the Cascade

Mountain range.

The rains have begun.

The trail, such as it was, turned into a bog of mud,

and they got stuck there.

You can imagine the fear of a group who remembers what

happened to the Donner Party just a year

before in a similar situation.

If they couldn't get their wagons moving,

they would be stuck through the winter in the deep snows.

There's no question of turning back.

They would never make it.

[fast music]

But somehow, they were able to pull the wagons out.

And the group as a whole made it to the Willamette Valley,

a lovely, warmer, moderate, very fertile zone of Oregon,

where they settled down for their first winter.

When we hear about stories like Lucinda Brown,

we realize that courage is sometimes

a value or an attribute that emerges in a time of crisis.

But once we realize the amount of courage we have,

we realize that it can serve us throughout our lives.

NARRATOR: Lucinda is one of 4,000 emigrants

to settle out West that year.

Within just five years, more than 140,000 have followed.

By the middle of the 19th century,

the nation is changing rapidly.

Thousands of miles of new railroad

criss‐cross the Eastern US.

Cattle ranchers drive their stock to cities in the North

and come to be known as cowboys.

Communication thrives with the rapid spread of the telegraph.

Industry booms, especially cotton.

The Southern United States produce over half the world's

supply.

MARK UPDEGROVE: Cotton is this incredibly lucrative export,

and it's the product that props up the Southern economy.

And the sole reason that they're able to produce cotton

as prolifically as they are is because of slave labor.

All of that economy is built on the backs of slaves.

NARRATOR: By 1850, there are over 3 million enslaved people

in the US, up from a million just 50 years earlier.

LEAH WRIGHT RIGUEUR: Slavery within the United States

is a violent system.

It is an exploitative system.

It is a deeply unjust, unequal, and illiberal system

that benefits a planter class, while being deeply

brutal to African Americans.

NARRATOR: Resistance to slavery grows

in the Northern free states, and abolitionist Harriet Tubman

guides escaping slaves to freedom on the Underground

Railroad.

STANLEY MCCHRYSTAL: She would go back and put her own liberty

and her own life at risk, just to help other people.

If she's recaptured, at a minimum,

she will be re‐enslaved.

More likely, she will be executed.

NARRATOR: By the end of the 1840s, resistance to slavery

is growing.

Abolitionists develop the Underground Railroad,

a clandestine network offering shelter and aid to escaped

enslaved people from the South.

People known as conductors lead the fugitives

to safety in the North.

One such conductor is Harriet Tubman.

In 1850, she makes her first crossing,

going back into the southern state of Maryland.

MARCIA CHATELAIN: Harriet Tubman was

a woman who was born unfree.

She understood fundamentally that her freedom was only

as valuable as the freedom of others who were

under the system of slavery.

NARRATOR: In 1850, Congress introduces the Fugitive Slave

Act.

MARCIA CHATELAIN: The Fugitive Slave Act

was a piece of legislation that made it law for any person

with knowledge of an escape enslaved person

responsible for their return and capture.

If a person is discovered to have

fled the condition of slavery, they could be returned.

They could be beaten.

They could lose their lives.

Any person who is assisting someone in this process

could lose their lives.

DAVARIAN BALDWIN: This created additional challenges

for Harriet Tubman because what it

meant is that her very existence was treason to federal law.

And yet, in the face of this new law, she didn't flinch.

She endured, she rose up, and she understood

that the moral authority of freedom

was greater than any act that was put in place by man.

NARRATOR: Tubman conducts more than a dozen successful rescue

missions.

MARCIA CHATELAIN: There is a story of leading

a group of people to freedom.

And there is a baby among the group,

and the baby lets out a cry.

And Tubman has to respond, has to understand

that that cry could essentially end this incredibly risky

mission.

So she uses morphine to quiet this baby.

And it is in that moment we really

understand that it wasn't just about a vision for freedom.

It was actual strategy and tactics

that allowed the Underground Railroad to thrive.

Come on, y'all.

There's a story of a man who is having second thoughts.

And Harriet Tubman pulls out a gun

and tells him that he will continue on this journey

and reminds him that nothing is greater than one

own's personal freedom.

STANLEY MCCHRYSTAL: She is a task master.

She told people what we were going to do.

Extraordinarily self‐disciplined‐‐ they

referred to her as the general.

And so she was a natural leader, even though she didn't

have stature or appointment.

NARRATOR: In time, over 100,000 will take the Underground

Railroad to freedom.

LEAH WRIGHT RIGUEUR: Harriet Tubman

is a transformative figure in American history.

She is fearless.

She is fierce.

She is fighting in defense of millions of individuals.

She gives them the leadership and the vision

and the confidence to move out of and fight their way

and resist through one of the most brutal periods

of American history.

MARK UPDEGROVE: America in the late 1850s

is becoming a tinderbox of tension,

solely around the question of slavery.

You can see the increasing polarization of America

around that single question.

NARRATOR: In 1859, white abolitionist John Brown

launches an attack on the US Army's arsenal

at Harpers Ferry.

DAVARIAN BALDWIN: This was huge because here's the moment where

you have a white abolitionist leading

a band of enslaved peoples to not wait for someone to give

their freedom, but they were going to take it

with military action.

Now, of course, for white slave owners,

this caused extreme anxiety.

It raised the specter and fear of slave uprisings.

NARRATOR: 1860 is a presidential election year.

A 51‐year‐old Illinois lawyer named

Abraham Lincoln wins the Republican Party nomination.

MARK UPDEGROVE: He's getting this great reputation

for integrity, which leads to his nickname Honest Abe.

But most importantly, he is this brilliant orator

who has a vision for what America should be going

forward.

NARRATOR: In November, Lincoln wins the presidential election.

But by the time he's inaugurated in March 1861, seven

Southern states secede and form the Confederate States

of America.

The United States stands on the brink of civil war.

[gunshot]

[yelling]

The North and South go to war.

There has not been a bigger challenge to our country

since its founding.

NARRATOR: Then, a war on crime.

JAMES MEIGS: Crime in New York was like something

out of a comic book.

NARRATOR: And a new leader is needed

to unite the nation again.

The public loved Roosevelt, even if the bosses despised

him.

[music playing]