Journal of the American Revolution kicked off summer 2015 with a fun group interview and several short features about important primary sources. This source series will continue another couple days and then we will resume our traditional editorial publishing after Independence Day. We have an exciting pipeline of articles planned for July. Verenna, Ruppert, Smith, […]
The British government’s policies toward the American colonies in the 1760s and 1770s were controversial in Great Britain; some people favored the government’s actions while others were sympathetic to the grievances of the colonists, with a wide range of opinions in between. When war broke out, the controversy continued, with some believing in reconciliation, some […]
One of the newspapers featured in Reporting the Revolutionary War was the Virginia Gazette dated August 26, 1775. In the book, Don N. Hagist describes its uniqueness as it relates to the Battle of Bunker Hill: A remarkable piece of journalism appeared in Dixon and Hunter’s Virginia Gazette on August 26, 1775. The illustrations that […]
From Bunker Hill to Yorktown, a feature of military actions during the American Revolution was the redoubt. Of course, redoubts were a fixture in world-wide military operations long before, and long after, that war, but those fortifications built of earth, sod and timber were usually more complex than their simple materials suggest. At a glance, […]
Maps are vital to understanding campaigns and battles. During the American Revolution, military planners often lamented the lack of good maps and went to great lengths to obtain geographic information. Officers with the proper training and tools could quickly produce sufficiently detailed renderings of the lay of the land, adding information as it became available. […]
From mid-August to early October, 1774, huge crowds gathered in the “shiretowns” of every county in contiguous, mainland Massachusetts (except Suffolk, where Boston is located) to shut down the courts. These courts, which served executive as well as judicial functions, were the farthest outreach of Crown authority. People at the time offered estimates of the […]
Cartoons were a vital part of England’s print media in the 1770s, and were almost exclusively of the sort that today we call editorial cartoons. Artists drew images packed with symbolism expressing opinions concerning current events. Sometimes they included word balloons and captions in prose or verse, but many were simple images that left the […]
Armies thrived on paperwork. With huge amounts of information to be recorded and tracked, non-commissioned officers and soldiers with good literacy, skill at basic mathematics, and steady penmanship were highly valued. Although data had to be recorded by hand, much of it was repetitive; by the era of the American Revolution, printed forms for recording […]
In the late summer and early fall of 1774, all of Massachusetts outside of Boston shed British rule. From October 1774 to April 1775, a Provincial Congress prepared to defend this revolution against an anticipated British counter-revolution, mustering supplies to outfit an army of 15,000. After Lexington and Concord, it fell upon the Provincial Congress […]
One of the most famous and recognizable eighteenth-century newspapers is the October 31, 1765 issue of the Pennsylvania Journal, also known as the “tombstone edition.” With the hated Stamp Act set to take effect in the British North American colonies on November 1, 1765, Philadelphia printer William Bradford designed this issue to resemble a tombstone, […]
Outside of the big four (Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Charleston), which city was most critical to the success of the Revolution? Why? Newport. British land and naval forces garrisoned in the rebellious nation’s fifth largest city for four years. Although the Continental Army failed to dislodge them in 1778, Newport served no great […]
What impact did British involvement elsewhere in the world have on operations in North America? Explain. As brilliantly told in Andrew Jackson O’Shaughnessy’s Men Who Lost America, in February 1781 Rodney sacked St. Eustatius, a Dutch-held Caribbean island that served as a major trading port for the shipment of arms and munitions to the […]
A lot has been written about the greatest writers and orators of the Revolution, but effective communication also requires good listening. Who was the best listener during the Revolution and what demonstrates or supports your selection? I’d give Henry Knox the prize for best listener. He seldom took the lead in discussions when he […]
During the protracted conflict, nations, colonies, committees and individuals had several opportunities to learn from their mistakes. In your opinion, what is the best example of a person or people learning from a mistake early in the Revolution, and applying the lesson learned later on? Gen. George Washington spent over two years of the […]
Which Revolutionary artifact do you wish was mistakenly delivered to your doorstep rather than the curator of a museum? Washington’s draft of The Farewell Address. As I tell the story in my new book, The Great Divide, the newspaper editor who printed said he liked it so much, he felt regret at returning it. […]
The next several weeks will be a short break from the usual content featured at Journal of the American Revolution, so we wanted to take this opportunity to give you a preview of what’s planned. Next week (June 8-12) will be our sixth group interview. Five days of Q&A with multiple historians. Spoiler alert: The […]
We are having a blast working with our contributors and Westholme Publishing to produce collectible hardbacks in 2015 and beyond, and we can’t wait to share the finished product, the inaugural fruits of the JAR-Westholme collaboration, with everyone. Yesterday, we received a box of our new books from our distributor, University of Chicago Press, and […]
When researching the Revolutionary War one is constantly keeping an eye out for primary source materials. Some of those sources are the very same books read by the people we study, including the wide range of books on military science published during the seventeen hundreds. Thomas Simes was one of the most prolific military writers […]
On June 8th, 1783, Gen. George Washington issued the following orders to the Continental army from his headquarters in Newburgh, New York: Serjeant Bissel of the 2d Connecticut regt. having performed some important services, within the immediate knowledge of the Commander in chief, in which the fidelity, perseverence, and good sense of the said serjeant […]
About Michael Schellhammer: Michael Schellhammer is a former U.S. Army infantry, intelligence, and civil affairs officer. He served in the Persian Gulf War, Haiti, Bosnia, and Iraq. His work has appeared in The Washington Post, The Washington Times and The Military Intelligence Professional Bulletin. He is the author of The 83rd Pennsylvania Volunteers in the […]
