From a ragged army crossing an icy river on Christmas night to Marines fighting their way out of a frozen trap in Korea, some of the proudest moments in American history came when the odds were stacked against them. This guide gathers ten battles where Americans, outnumbered, surrounded or written off, won anyway.
Ten battles against the odds
Trenton, 1776 · Washington crosses the icy Delaware on Christmas night and surprises the Hessian garrison.
Princeton, 1777 · days later Washington slips past the British and wins again, saving the Revolution's winter.
Kings Mountain, 1780 · frontier militia destroy a Loyalist force on a wooded ridge in the Carolinas.
Cowpens, 1781 · Daniel Morgan's double envelopment crushes Tarleton's feared British legion.
Lake Erie, 1813 · Oliver Hazard Perry builds a fleet in the wilderness and captures a British squadron.
New Orleans, 1815 · Andrew Jackson's mixed army shatters a British assault from behind its earthworks.
Midway, 1942 · outnumbered US carriers sink four Japanese carriers and turn the Pacific War.
Bastogne and the Bulge, 1944 · encircled American paratroopers refuse to surrender, and the German offensive fails.
Chosin Reservoir, 1950 · surrounded Marines and soldiers fight their way out through freezing mountains.
Belleau Wood, 1918 · US Marines stop a German advance toward Paris and take the wood in weeks of fighting.
Revolution against an empire
Four of these battles come from the War of Independence, when a new nation took on the world's greatest empire. Trenton and Princeton saved a cause that seemed lost in the winter of 1776, while Kings Mountain and Cowpens turned the war in the South.
Holding on in the twentieth century
In the world wars and Korea the odds took different shapes: four Japanese carriers against three American ones at Midway, encircled paratroopers at Bastogne, and roughly 120,000 Chinese troops, by common estimates, around some 30,000 Marines and soldiers at Chosin. For the full sweep, see the greatest battles in American history.
