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Yeah, cheese it. Hello and thank you for joining the American Revolution.

This week episode 221 the Collier Matthew raids.

Following the entry of France into the war in 1778,

British policy in America shifted dramatically.

London essentially put the war against New England and the mid-Atlantic states on hold.

They redeployed much of their army to the West Indies,

where valuable islands were up for grabs,

and also hoped to reclaim a few of the southern colonies

where they expected to find a fair number of loyalists ready to support them.

Virginia, however, was not part of this southern strategy. It was a heavily populated state and officials did not see a large loyalist uprising there.

As a result, Virginia had pretty much avoided being the scene of many battles in the war up until this time.

Even in 1779, that was not really going to change.

The British were still having trouble securing Georgia

and just making some tentative attempts at South Carolina,

as I discussed last week.

Launching a massive land invasion into Virginia was not part of anyone's plan.

The other part of Britain's plan was to harass the coasts.

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