Author: Gabriel Neville

Gabe Neville is engaged in a long-term research project on the 8th Virginia Regiment and maintains a blog on the subject at 8thVirginia.com. He writes and speaks from time to time on related topics and intends to produce a book on the regiment’s unique career. A former journalist and congressional staffer, he now works as a senior advisor at a Washington, DC law firm. He lives in northern Virginia with his wife and two sons.

Economics Posted on January 29, 2024February 27, 2024

The Continental Dollar: How the American Revolution Was Financed with Paper Money

BOOK REVIEW: The Continental Dollar: How the American Revolution Was Financed with Paper Money by Farley Grubb (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2023) Economists and historians have been telling us the wrong story about Continental currency for two centuries. Continental money did not lose its value because Congress printed too much of it. In fact, […]

by Gabriel Neville

Battles Posted on April 17, 2023May 15, 2023

The Battle of Musgrove’s Mill, 1780

BOOK REVIEW: The Battle of Musgrove’s Mill, 1780 by John Buchanan (Yardley, PA: Westholme, 2022) British victory in the Revolution required one thing above all: the ability of American Loyalists to retake and hold the civil and military functions of government. Then as now, occupying armies are expensive and cannot stay forever. In this light, […]

by Gabriel Neville

Historic Sites Posted on February 16, 2023February 19, 2023

Grave Errors: Inaccurate Markers for the 8th Virginia Regiment Soldiers

Of the roughly nine hundred men who served at some point in the 8th Virginia Regiment in the Revolutionary War, only fifty-two have identified graves. Several of them are marked with wrong information that needs to be corrected. In some cases, the information is dramatically wrong. Sadly, this review of fifty-two grave markers from just […]

by Gabriel Neville

Political Philosophy Posted on January 23, 2023

Religious Liberty and the American Founding

BOOK REVIEW: Religious Liberty and the American Founding: Natural Rights and the Original Meaning of the First Amendment Religion Clauses by Vincent Phillip Muñoz (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2022) We are told in the Declaration of Independence that certain rights are “unalienable.” Have you ever wondered what that means? Are other rights “alienable?” Notre Dame’s […]

by Gabriel Neville

Politics During the War (1775-1783) Posted on June 27, 2022June 28, 2022

Our Dear Bought Liberty: Catholics and Religious Toleration in Early America

BOOK REVIEW: Our Dear Bought Liberty: Catholics and Religious Toleration in Early America by Michael D. Breidenbach (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2021) Most Americans in pre-revolutionary times had a strong dislike of Catholicism. They believed it to be a religion of ignorance, a religion of tyranny, and the religion of the enemy. The ever-opinionated John […]

by Gabriel Neville

Political Philosophy Posted on February 14, 2022February 13, 2022

Religion and the American Revolution: An Imperial History

BOOK REVIEW: Religion and the American Revolution: An Imperial History by Katherine Carté (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press/Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture, 2021) Dwight Eisenhower once said that “our form of government has no sense unless it is founded in a deeply felt religious faith, and I don’t care what it […]

by Gabriel Neville

Frontier Posted on March 18, 2021March 15, 2021

Virginia’s Independent Frontier Companies, Part 2 of 2

The 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 and proposed that Congress do the same. It adopted a new constitution and a Declaration of Rights that would immediately be the model for the Declaration of Independence and later provide […]

by Gabriel Neville

Frontier Posted on March 17, 2021September 3, 2021

Virginia’s Independent Frontier Companies, Part 1 of 2

When the American Revolution began, the Virginia Colony faced not one military-territorial contest, but four. Its ousted Royal governor, Lord Dunmore, was in the Chesapeake actively plotting a forcible return to power. A longstanding dispute with Pennsylvania over the headwaters of the Ohio had turned violent. A formal peace with the Shawnee on the northwest […]

by Gabriel Neville

Features Posted on January 25, 2021February 1, 2021

Review: To the End of the World: Nathanael Greene, Charles Cornwallis, and the Race to the Dan

To the End of the World: Nathanael Greene, Charles Cornwallis, and the Race to the Dan by Andrew Waters (Yardley, PA: Westholme Publishing, 2020) “In a place like Salisbury,” writes Andrew Waters of the North Carolina town that witnessed the 1781 Race to the Dan, “you can live among its ghosts and still not know […]

by Gabriel Neville

Battles Posted on October 19, 2020October 25, 2020

The 10 Key Campaigns of the American Revolution

The 10 Key Campaigns of the American Revolution edited by Edward G. Lengel (Washington, D.C: Regnery, 2020). Edward Lengel begins this book with a remarkable claim. He writes, “The American War for Independence remains—now, nearly 250 years since its onset—a relatively new field of study.” This will initially strike many readers as a wild assertion. How […]

by Gabriel Neville

Features Posted on August 10, 2020August 8, 2020

General Peter Muhlenberg: A Virginia Officer of the Continental Line

General Peter Muhlenberg: A Virginia Officer of the Continental Line by Michael Cecere (Yardley, Pa: Westholme, 2020) “The General, mounted upon a white horse, tall and commanding in his figure, was very conspicuous at the head of his men…many of the [enemy] soldiers (German enlistments being for life,) remembered their former comrade, and the cry ran […]

by Gabriel Neville

Features Posted on June 3, 2020May 23, 2020

George Rogers Clark and William Croghan

George Rogers Clark and William Croghan: A Story of the Revolution, Settlement, and Early Life at Locust Grove by Gwynne Tuell Potts (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2020) “The phenomenon of fame confounds and fascinates, indiscriminately raising some to glory while consigning apparent equals to exile.” This is Gwynne Tuell Potts’s insight in her new book […]

by Gabriel Neville

Patriots Posted on December 3, 2019December 2, 2019

Shenandoah Martyr: Richard Campbell at War

There is no dignity in being forgotten. A case in point is Virginia Lt. Col. Richard Campbell, a Continental officer who died bravely for his country but lies today in an unmarked grave far from his home. “Killed near the end of the battle at Eutaw Springs,” wrote the authors of a 2017 study of […]

by Gabriel Neville

Critical Thinking Posted on August 1, 2019August 1, 2019

The Tragedy of Henry Laurens

It wasn’t really their fault, they said. Slavery, men of the founding generation liked to argue, was brought to the colonies by Britain. It came via Barbados and the other sugar islands of the Caribbean. Thomas Jefferson and Henry Laurens both blamed Britain and wished the colonies could free themselves of the practice. It was […]

by Gabriel Neville

Historic Sites Posted on July 16, 2019July 15, 2019

The Last Vestige of the Clove Road

With no actionable intelligence, General Washington had to guess where British Maj. Gen. William Howe was taking his army. So in July 1777, he led the Continental Army north from New Jersey into what was then a rough, dangerous, and little-known pass through New York’s Ramapo Mountains. He had guessed incorrectly, however, and they were […]

by Gabriel Neville

Features Posted on April 10, 2018September 3, 2021

The “B Team” of 1777: Maxwell’s Light Infantry

On the topic of Maxwell’s Light Infantry, Lt. Col. William Heth’s views were crystal clear. “Maxwells Corps ’Twas expected would do great things,” he complained in a letter, “we had opportunities—and any body but an old-woman, would have availd themselves of them—He is to be sure—a Damnd bitch of a General.”[1] The subject of his […]

by Gabriel Neville