AskHistorians

This seems to be teetering on the idea that the British forces were completely befuddled by the idea of skirmish tactics. Roger's Rangers were an example of a well established and valued scout unit under the Crown's command through the French & Indian War and revived during the Revolution. The British were well aware of the capabilities.

Conventional line infantry played a completely different role than scout units, and for the time and tactics, camouflage was less valuable than clear uniformity. On a battlefield between standing armies using slow loading muskets, military units worked as a whole and camouflage didn't play a large role.

For the Americans, the short version is that while hit and run tactics played a part, the real turning point of the war for the military was the support of France, and for a specific example Baron von Steuben's training of US troops. The US military didn't win through irregular tactics overcoming the British military, but through transforming into a standing military that fought from a similar handbook as the British.

Thats the thing, they were not ideal conditions.

You could see a few dozen yards tops while choking on gunsmoke as 50 guys all fired at the same time. Muskets were cartoonishly inaccurate, they had ~30% chance of the bullet rattling around in the barrel and landing in the dirt if you were aiming for something 30 yards out (provided you could see it, and quickly ID whos side that formation was on). To compensate for that, volley fire was the most effective means doing reliable damage to the opposing army.

The tactics at the time were just developing past the need for pikes and long pointy sticks. Napoleon and the US civil war did the same things, but that was after rifling was invented and bullets usually when where you pointed the loud end of the gun. They were still 150 years out from WWI and thats when, IMO, formality was fully phased out for practicality.