Print Media and Isaiah Thomas
by‘Tis to ye Press & Pen we Mortals owe All we believe & almost all we know: —George Fischer, The American Instructor: or, Young…
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Key to Victory: Foreign Assistance to America’s Revolutionary War
byHistorians have long appreciated that the colonies could not have won the American Revolutionary War against the most powerful nation in the world without…
This Week on Dispatches: Geoff Smock on the Teenage Thomas Jefferson
byOn this week’s Dispatches, host Brady Crytzer interviews educator and JAR contributor Geoff Smock on his research into the teenage years of Thomas Jefferson,…
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Fake News of the Surrender of Quebec: A Video Contribution
byIn 1776, the Pennsylvania Evening Post printed a letter, allegedly from Paris, which reported that American commander Benedict Arnold had captured the last major British…
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Contributor Close-Up: Robert Davis
byWhat inspired you to start researching and writing about the Revolution? In 1974, Governor Jimmy Carter of Georgia began a state internship program. I…
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Loyalist Slave-Owning Refugees in Postwar Jamaica
byThe two forces of paternalism and slavery shaped the lives of Loyalist slaveowners in the postwar British Empire. Historians rarely connect these forces in…
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Review: Valcour: The 1776 Campaign That Saved the Cause of Liberty
byValcour: The 1776 Campaign That Saved the Cause of Liberty by Jack Kelly (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2021) Scholarly focus on decisive military actions…
This Week on Dispatches: Richard J. Werther on King Gustav III of Sweden Recognizing the United States
byOn this week’s Dispatches, host Brady Crytzer interviews researcher and JAR contributor Richard J. Werther on King Gustav III of Sweden’s recognition of an…
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Easy as Falling Off a Horse
byHorses have been used for transportation for thousands of years, but have caused countless injuries and deaths. There is a saying that the only…
Traders or Traitors? The New Jersey Shop License Law of 1780
byFollowing the campaign of 1776, New York City and environs were occupied by British forces. For the rest of the war, George Washington threatened,…
Five Women of British East Florida
byIn the male-dominated historical record of East Florida during the era of the American Revolution, a few women stand out as noteworthy. Most women…
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Review: Colonel Hamilton and Colonel Burr
byColonel Hamilton and Colonel Burr: The Revolutionary War Lives of Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr by Arthur S. Lefkowitz (Stackpole Books, 2020) Students of…
This Week on Dispatches: John Rees on Remembrances of Black Revolutionary War Veterans
byOn this week’s Dispatches, host Brady Crytzer interviews writer, researcher, historian, and JAR contributor John Rees on his series of articles about nineteenth-century remembrances…
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John Rutledge: Governor of South Carolina, 1779
byJohn Rutledge had been prominent in South Carolina politics virtually since establishing his Charleston law practice in 1761. He served in the General Assembly,…
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John Rutledge: President of South Carolina, 1776–1778
byJohn Rutledge was born into Charleston’s elite in 1739 and by April 1775 had established himself as a defender of English rights in the…
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John Rutledge: Delegate from South Carolina, 1765–1775
byJohn Rutledge is one of those members of the founding generation who often get overlooked. Yet, for every Jefferson, Adams, or Washington, there were…
Review: Valley Forge to Monmouth
byValley Forge to Monmouth: Six Transformational Months of the American Revolution by Jim Stempel (McFarland, 2021) Captivated by the short preface, it was evident this…
This Week on Dispatches: Todd Braisted on Benjamin Thompson’s Black Dragoons
byOn this week’s Dispatches, host Brady Crytzer interviews researcher, writer, and JAR contributor Todd Braisted on loyalist Benjamin Thompson—later Count Mumford—and the provincial mounted regiment that…
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Virginia’s Independent Frontier Companies, Part 2 of 2
byThe Fifth Virginia Convention convened in Williamsburg in May 1776 with a weighty agenda before it. The 169-year-old colony declared its independence from Britain…
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Virginia’s Independent Frontier Companies, Part 1 of 2
byWhen the American Revolution began, the Virginia Colony faced not one military-territorial contest, but four. Its ousted Royal governor, Lord Dunmore, was in the…
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Nathanael Greene and the Challenge of Supplying the Southern Army
byA New England Quaker in his late thirties was not the ideal candidate for the job, according to the Continental Congress. Instead, Congress chose…
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Smells Like Teen Spirit: The Teenage Thomas Jefferson
byWithin the pantheon of Founding Fathers, only George Washington was more impenetrable than was Thomas Jefferson—then and now. The man who would come to…
This Week on Dispatches: Andrew Zellers-Frederick on the Impeachment of Senator William Blount, the First in American History
byOn this week’s Dispatches, host Brady Crytzer interviews historian and JAR contributor Andrew Zellers-Frederick on the impeachment of Senator William Blount of Tennessee, the…
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Clement Biddle Partially Clears the “Battle of the Clouds”
byOne of the more intriguing limited actions of the Revolutionary War was the Battle of the Clouds on September 16, 1777, a meeting of…
Robert Bisset’s East Florida Holdings
byCaptain Robert Bisset arrived in East Florida in 1767. Immediately upon his coming, he set to work on establishing himself as a planter. For…
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Riflemen Run Riot: The Mutiny at Prospect Hill
by“They are remarkably stout and hardy men,” thought army surgeon James Thacher, “Dressed in white frocks, or rifle shirts, and round hats.” The robust…
Thomas Read of Delaware, Part 3: Continental Navy Commander
byThomas Read (1740-1788) began his seafaring career as a merchant captain, sailing for the Philadelphia firm of Willing and Morris in the ship Aurora,…
This Week on Dispatches: Mark Sullivan on Francis and Gottlieb Otto, Loyalists or Rebels?
byOn this week’s Dispatches, host Brady Crytzer interviews writer, historian, and twenty-five year US Army veteran Mark Sullivan on his recent JAR article about…
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Thomas Read of Delaware, Part 2: Commodore in the Pennsylvania Navy
byThomas Read (1740-1788) of New Castle, Delaware, as we read in the first part of this series, began his seafaring career as a merchant…
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Seventeen Testimonies Seal New Smyrna’s Fate, 1777
byIn March 1777, while Andrew Turnbull was away in England, several Minorcans escaped New Smyrna and fled to St. Augustine, East Florida. They hiked seventy…
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Thomas Read of Delaware, Part 1: The Creation of the Continental Navy
byThomas Read (1740-1788) was the middle son of the Read family of New Castle, Delaware. His older brother George was a delegate to the…
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King Gustav III of Sweden: Friendly Foe of the United States
byNew York City, November 16, 1783. It was finally here, Evacuation Day. The British, who had occupied Manhattan for seven long years, were finally…
This Week on Dispatches: Brooke Barbier on Paul Revere’s Boston
byOn this week’s Dispatches, host Brady Crytzer interviews writer and podcast host Brooke Barbier about historic sites in Boston that were familiar to Paul Revere….
Nineteenth-Century Remembrances of Black Revolutionary Veterans: New Jersey Soldier Oliver Cromwell
byHarriet Tubman escaped from slavery in 1849. She became a major conductor on the Underground Railroad, as well as an advocate for Women’s Rights….
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Incredible Insults and Hardships: The Hostage Experience of Ebenezer Sullivan
byWhen twenty-three-year-old Capt. Ebenezer Sullivan nobly volunteered himself as a prisoner-exchange hostage in the last weeks of the Canadian invasion, he had no way…
Such As Are Absolutely Free: Benjamin Thompson’s Black Dragoons
byAt the Museum of the American Revolution in Philadelphia, there is an exhibit in the core gallery examining the choices, opportunities and constraints of…
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Black Haitian Soldiers at the Siege of Savannah
byThe story of the Black Haitian soldiers serving in the French army in the battles to wrest Savannah, Georgia, from the British in September–October…
This Week on Dispatches: William W. Reynolds on the British Naval Signals Missions of 1781
byOn this week’s Dispatches, host Brady Crytzer interviews retired engineer and JAR contributor William W. Reynolds on how the Americans were able to obtain…
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The Admission of North Carolina and Rhode Island into the Union
byOn November 21, 1789, the people of the state of North Carolina ratified the United States Constitution. On May 29, 1790, the people of…