Non-Profit Dedicated to Historical Education of the American Revolution and the Colonial Period
This afternoon, January 30, 2021, while watching President Joe Biden take the oath of office as the 46th President, I was moved by the peaceful transition of power that reaffirms our democracy and that which binds us together as one nation. And how, these past couple of months, we came so close to witnessing its …
If we advert to the nature of republican government, we shall find that the censorial power is in the people over the government, and not in the government over the people. James Madison, 1793 According to University of Virginia Professor John Stagg, James Madison, our fourth president, was “from the early days of the American …
In just the past couple of years there’s been a wealth of invigorating new books published on the American Revolution. We find great biographies; some long over due that highlight both Americans and British warriors as well as statesmen. Featured are the likes of John Haslet of the famed Delaware regiment, Benjamin Rush, army surgeon, …
By 1774, colonial Americans had spent decades governing themselves. They were ingrained with a spirt of independence that strengthened with each new generation. Local legislatures were chosen by regional landowners. Provincial assemblies made laws, oversaw magistrates to enact laws, ruled over disputes, levied penalties, and saw to the daily needs of their communities. They organized …
The seeds of self-governance began in America with the first splash of the Mayflower’s anchor in 1620, nearly seventy years before the idea of self-rule was encouraged in England. Great Britain’s Glorious Revolution of 1688 and the 1689 Bill of Rights established that the British Parliament, and not the king, had the ultimate authority in …
There are so many important texts available on African American Studies and understanding what it means to be black in America. From slavery to civil rights, millions of Americans have been embroiled in a long and difficult fight for freedom, equality, identity, and social justice. A struggle that to this day, permeates throughout a nation …
By Harry Schenawolf, author of the Shades of Liberty Series about African American soldiers in the American Revolution. Like the horse, honey bees were once native to North America. And like the horse, the species died out, only to be reintroduced by Europeans thousands of years later, millions in the case of honey bees. The …
In 18th century America, where news and the powers of persuasion depended on pamphlets or word of mouth, coffeehouses rose supreme among all outlets of media. Politicians, merchants, businessmen, farmers, and mekanics – the working-class muscle of rebellion – consumed pages upon pages of lengthy opinions detailed in pamphlets and distributed among the colonial American …
Colonial America’s social positions were not so rigidly fixed as they were in England. It is not to say the wealthy land owners and rich merchants of the new world did not take on aristocratic airs. In many respects, then as now, they expected to be treated like royalty, if not more so than in …
Kip’s Bay, mid-Manhattan Island, New York, September 15, 1776. American militia, including New England brigades of Continental Soldiers, among the best in the American army, ran for their lives before invading British steel. What occurred next, occasionally seen by General George Washington’s inner family of staff, was rarely if ever experienced by the rank and …
“The Colonies will no longer need Britain’s protection. She will call on them to contribute toward supporting the burdens they have helped to bring on her, and they will answer by striking off their chains.” Comte de Vergennes at the close of the French and Indian War Myth 1: Americans were the subject of intense …
American slaves took interest when sporadic cases by individual African Americans questioned the rights of white ownership in court and won their freedom. They took heart after the Somerset ruling in which England’s Chief Justice William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield stated that the air of England was too free for a slave to breathe …
Boston Tea Party, December 16, 1773, was the overt action that sparked a revolution in America. When approximately one hundred ‘patriots’ disguised as Native Americans, catapulting Smuggler John Hancock, Failed Brewer Samuel Adams, and Silversmith Paul Reverie into the annuals of legend, dumped sack upon sack of East India tea into Boston’s murky waters, one …
The colonists, during the period building up to the American Revolutionary War, were becoming more and more aggressive towards England. However, before Great Britain and Parliament rattled the chains that ‘enslaved Americans and gained the vexation of those seeking liberty’, there was another class of individuals better suited to and far more deserving of the …
Historian Opinions are Mixed Historians have been vocal in their summation of Major General Israel Putnam’s actions and command decisions during the American Revolutionary War. The leading authorities such as Fellows, Dawson, Gordon, Ramsay, Stiles, Bancroft, Field, Lossing, Trevelyan, Ward, and Johnston (to name a few), have all offered evaluations and explanations of what occurred …