The "redcoats" well-honed skills, coupled with their discipline under fire enabled them to fend off regiment after regiment of the U.S. Army.

On the march between battles, British contingents advanced cautiously, sending out flank guards of forty to fifty men to survey the woods and fields. Once they reached a defendable location they would halt, even if they had marched less than ten miles that day.

In battle, they followed the Duke of Wellington's field drill. This meant firing their muskets in lines two or three ranks thick. One row of soldiers crouched and reloaded while another line fired over them. Often the men stood shoulder-to-shoulder; if a soldier in the front line was killed or wounded, another one stepped forward to take his place.

Most battles were fought at extremely close range. The idea was to destroy the enemy by blasting them with musket fire from hundreds of guns. The soldiers would then race through the smoky haze to impale the enemy with their bayonets. The sight of a continuous line of well-trained British soldiers advancing relentlessly amid the cacophony of battle was often enough to put the amateur American militia to flight.