How many Americans stayed loyal to the king, and what happened to them?
Perhaps one colonist in five backed the Crown, and only about one in seven of those left once the war was lost.
▶ Start the storyHistorians have estimated that between 15% and 33% of the colonists were : people who stayed loyal to the British crown. One researcher suggested 15% to 20% of the white colonists in 1775, which is 300,000 to 400,000 people, against Patriots of only 40 to 45 percent, with much of the population trying to avoid involvement. So the Revolution was not a case of a united people against a distant king.
15–33%
Many were not enemies of colonial rights. The Maryland lawyer Daniel Dulany the Younger opposed taxation without representation but would not break his to the king or take up arms against him. Families split: Benjamin Franklin's son William, the last royal governor of New Jersey, became a Loyalist leader.
They were also treated harshly. According to one account, Patriot committees published lists of suspected and, in campaigns of terror, harassed, and sometimes murdered them.
After Britain lost, about 15% of , some 65,000 to 70,000 people, fled to other parts of the British Empire, especially to Britain and to British North America, where they became known as United Empire Loyalists. Estimates differ, since the records were incomplete and inaccurate. Those who left got over £3 million from the British government, about 37% of their losses. Yet the vast majority of Loyalists stayed. Most kept their property and became American citizens, and by 1787 most states had their anti-Tory laws.
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Recap
Perhaps one colonist in five stayed loyal, and most Loyalists stayed in the United States after the war.
💡 A trick to remember it · Some left, most stayed: the king's friends mostly ended up as neighbours again.
Surprising fact · Only about 15% of Loyalists left, so the vast majority of them remained and became American citizens.
Sources (1)
No source, no claim. Every fact in this lesson (18 claims) cites at least one of these.