Capture of Fort Ticonderoga

Three weeks after Lexington and Concord, Ethan Allen's Green Mountain Boys and Benedict Arnold surprised the small British garrison at Fort Ticonderoga on Lake Champlain before dawn on May 10, 1775, taking it without a fight. It was the first American offensive of the war.

The prize was the fort's artillery. Over the winter, Henry Knox hauled some sixty cannon hundreds of miles to Boston, where they were placed on Dorchester Heights and forced the British to evacuate the city in March 1776.