In May 1775, a letter was sent to British General Thomas Gage in Boston the likes of which had never been received before. The letter certainly looked harmless enough. It was very short, and it didn’t say anything important at all—it simply requested the delivery of some papers. But this mysterious letter contained far more […]
Richard Cranch was born on October 26, 1726, in Kingsbridge, Devon, England, the youngest of seven children.[1] The Cranch family had lived in Devon for centuries and had been involved in woolen manufacture for many years. Cranch was apprenticed as a wool-card maker, and emigrated to Boston on the ship Wilmington, arriving on November 2, […]
The year is 1764, and smallpox is sweeping the town of Boston. One of Paul Revere’s children is stricken, and the family chooses to quarantine in their home until the child recovers.[1] The local newspapers document new smallpox cases. Incoming vessels with smallpox victims on board are impounded, and the passengers and crews are immediately […]
Largely ignored by scholars, Thomas Nelson Jr. of Yorktown, Virginia, was among the patriots who dared all when he signed the Declaration of Independence. He was well known to the wealthy and powerful of the era as a member of the Virginia gentry which held vast political and economic sway within the colony. Nelson filled […]
John L. Linn, born March 21, 1738, was most likely the son of John and Elizabeth Linn of Philadelphia and was baptized on April 3 of the same year.[1] He was apparently one of the early graduates of the Philadelphia College of Medicine where he earned his medical degree.[2] Linn is not listed as a […]
Jean Thurel, or Jean Theurel, is one of those very unusual people whose life extended over three centuries. He was born in Orain, Departement de la Côte-d’Or, Bourgogne, France on September 6, 1698 during the reign of Louis XIV. He died at Tours, Indre-et-Loire, France on March 10, 1807 during the reign of Napoleon I. […]
In the spring of 1775, after war broke out at Lexington and Concord, a British garrison in Boston was surrounded by militia troops from all over New England. News of British reinforcements enroute made it clear that further violence was likely. Doctor Joseph Warren, a widower and one of the key organizers of the American […]
Along the banks of the Delaware River—in what is now Upper Makefield Township on the Pennsylvania side and Hopewell Township on the New Jersey side—lie a pair of preternaturally venerated sites, indelibly linked by their shared connection to one of the most notable military enterprises the world has ever known. That would be the legendary […]
Historian Richard Kohn argued in 1981 that to make progress in military history, the first thing historians would need to do would be to seek the “true identity of soldiers” grounded in the community and time from which they came. Among those soldiers was John Shee, an Irish gentleman from Ballyreddin, County Kilkenny born to […]
Introduction As America enters its semiquincentennial year in 2026, there will be numerous celebrations and remembrances of the nation’s founding. The names George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Samuel Adams, Paul Revere, and others will ring familiar as patriots who drafted key documents such as the Declaration of Independence, rode across the countryside to alert […]
Eighteenth-century America was predominantly Protestant, and the Thirteen Colonies suffered from a virulent strain of anti-Catholicism. Despite this, the mostly-Protestant Founding Fathers, while being greatly inspired by their Protestant English forebears, were greatly inspired by Catholic thinkers as well. The United States was not established as a Christian country, with American diplomats asserting in 1797: […]
Joseph Warren was the embodiment of the American colonists’ struggle to secure their rights. In 1775 he was a widowed father of four young children and an esteemed Boston physician. He served as chairman of the Committee of Safety and president of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress. He authored the Suffolk Resolves, which was unanimously endorsed […]
The American Revolution west of the Appalachians produced a number of stories, which in their constant retelling evolved into legends. They created a unique frontier mythology. Just as ancient Greece had Achilles and Odysseus, America west of the Appalachians had Daniel Boone and Simon Kenton. An American officer and frontier scout, Samuel Brady, became one […]
In the year 1775, two days after the spring equinox, a meeting was held in Pennsylvania’s York County of over one hundred freemen and an agreement was written to bind them into an Association. The agreement, now in the Rare Book Room of the York County History Center in York, Pennsylvania, read as follows: The […]
The Paradox as Context The literature of the Revolution is replete with references to the Founding Fathers’ recognition of the anguishing contradiction between the ideals they ostensibly endorsed in the Declaration of Independence—specifically Thomas Jefferson’s rhetoric about human equality and inalienable rights—and the commitment many of them made to sustaining the institution of human bondage […]
The life of Eleanor “Nelly” Parke Custis Lewis was one of privilege and loss. After the premature death of her father, John “Jacky” Parke Custis, in 1781, Nelly and her younger brother, George Washington “Wash” Custis, were sent to Mount Vernon to live with their paternal grandmother, Martha, and her husband George Washington. Under the […]
If you’ve travelled on US Interstate 90 in New York between Albany and Rome, New York, you may have noticed the words FORT PLAIN emblazoned on a hillside rising up on one side of the highway. It would be easy to assume that this just announces the town of Fort Plain, but for the Revolutionary […]
Agrippa Hull was a free black man who enlisted in the Continental Army from Stockbridge, Massachusetts, and served for six and a half years until the end of hostilities. In early 2024 the Museum & Archives of the Stockbridge Library Association acquired, through private sale, Agrippa Hull’s certificate of discharge from the Continental Army, dated […]
Historians generally agree on who were America’s principal Founders, but the roll call invariably omits the name of one individual without whose steadfast assistance the United States would have been unlikely to have gained independence. Comte Charles Gravier de Vergennes, France’s foreign minister throughout the long, desperate war, was a crucial player in America’s victory […]
Until 1765, there were no medical schools in the American colonies. In the words of one historian, a man aspiring to the medical profession was obliged to acquire his training as an apprentice to an older doctor. Beginning usually at fifteen years of age, he took care of the physician’s office and his horse, and […]
The Revolutionary War in the Ohio and Upper Mississippi River Valleys is generally looked upon as a side show to the main conflict along the Atlantic Seaboard. However, the impact of the forces in the Old Northwest Territory was much greater than their small size could have anticipated. Historian Pauline Peyton posited that had the […]
In New York City, at nine o’clock in the morning on Thursday, April 30, 1789, Americans of diverse Christian denominations filed into their churches in and around Broad Street. Once settled, their respective clergymen led them in prayer, asking for “the blessing of Heaven upon the new government.” These well-wishers also pleaded for divine “protection […]
Although a genuine folk hero, little has been published about Elijah Clark (often spelled Clarke) beyond well-intended historical fiction.[1] Like his contemporaries Daniel Boone and George Rogers Clark, he should be remembered as an important frontier leader. Clark’s first biographer, Absalom Harris Chappell, wrote in 1874 that he would never have been known if he […]
The Fourth of July celebration of 1831 was shaping up similarly to the ones Americans had been commemorating for over half a century. A sizable crowd squeezed into the Rotunda of the United States Capitol Building to hear lawyer and poet Francis Scott Key deliver an Independence Day oration. In Boston’s Park Street Church the […]
George Washington was a colonel in the Virginia militia, master of Mount Vernon, founding father, commander-in-chief of the Continental Army, first president of the United States, and Father of his Country. The nation’s capital, many other towns and thousands of streets carry the Washington name. Yet, George Washington “was far less powerful in the tiny […]
Michael Cecere’s latest book, Spark of Independence: The American Revolution in the Northern Colonies, 1775–1776 has been published. Mike is a long-time contributor to JAR, in addition to being an author, historian, and reenactor. Spark of Independence is the final volume of his Independence Trilogy, and is the latest in the JAR Books Series. Its […]
We asked our contributors for their favorite spooky stories from the 1765-1805 era. Here are the responses: Robert S. Davis Colonel John Dooly of Georgia was assassinated, killed, or murdered in his home while a prisoner of war on parole. That event has spurred numerous legends and stories. Was he killed in retaliation for Elijah […]
It is not often that one comes across inspiration for research from a trading card. But sure enough, when this author came across a card produced by Topps featuring John Adams, he was inspired. The card, part of a set commemorating Presidential connections to the game of baseball, mentioned how Adams had mentioned playing a […]
On this week’s Dispatches, host Brady Crytzer tells the suspenseful tale of the “Wizard Clip” a famous ghost story of the colonial western frontier. New episodes of Dispatches are available for free every Saturday evening (Eastern United States Time) on iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, Amazon Music, and the JAR Dispatches web site. Dispatches can now be easily accessed […]
James Craik was born in Scotland, circa 1727, on the 1,400-acre estate of his father William Craik, member of the British parliament. He attended Edinburgh medical school; the first medical school in the English-speaking world. After graduation Dr. Craik served in the British army in the West Indies. Leaving the army, he set up medical […]
Poet Phillis Wheatley (c. 1753-1784) was a consistent and passionate advocate for liberty in every form: she called for an end to slavery, championed political and religious freedoms, and considered a sinful life to be a kind of servitude. She consistently opposed British infringements on American rights and saw political oppression as a form of […]
John Clark Ridpath wrote in 1898, The pre-revolutionists are the Titans of human history; the revolutionists proper are only heroes; and the post revolutionists are too frequently dwarfs and weaklings. This signifies that civilization advances by revolutionary stages, and that history sends out her tallest and best sons to explore the line of march and […]
Christopher Gadsden arrived as a South Carolina delegate to the Second Continental Congress three weeks after fighting at Lexington and Concord lit the tinder for the American Revolution. He succinctly captured the backlash of collective anxiety when he created the iconic flag of a coiled and agitated rattlesnake conspicuously warning Britain of the ramifications with […]
In 1902, the new owner of a furnished house in Medford, Massachusetts, was rummaging through the accoutrements and amenities of his recent acquisition. John O’Callaghan then noticed a box with an unusual inscription: “Here’s our family flag from the war.” Intrigued, O’Callaghan opened the container and found a frayed flag. As he unfolded the red, […]
“If one is to truly love a country, one must be acquainted with its history and what it took for that country to stand today. In this particular field, I was, and I believe still am, lacking. After reading and studying My Brother Sam is Dead, however, I have come to a better understanding of […]
In April 1775, Isaac Bissell was a crucial link between the Patriots of Massachusetts and the government of neighboring Connecticut. His actions contributed to alerting many communities along the Atlantic coast about the outbreak of war in Lexington. Nevertheless, through a chain of circumstances, Isaac Bissell’s name has been overwritten in history books.[1] This story […]
As Founding Fathers of the United States met in Philadelphia to declare that “all men are created equal,” Thomas Craik Jr. was born into a family of people enslaved by Dr. James Craik on his Maryland plantations.[1] This was not unusual at the time; many of the colonial landed gentry relied upon slave labor to […]
BOOK REVIEW: The Unexpected Abigail Adams: A Woman “Not Apt to Be Intimidated” by John L. Smith, Jr. (Westholme, 2024, $32.50 hardcover) “I will never consent to have our sex considered an inferior point of light. Let each planet shine in their own orbit, God and nature intended it so—if man is Lord, woman is […]
In January 1792 forty-three-year-old Arthur Bowler left Halifax, Nova Scotia, on his second Transatlantic journey. Captured in Africa almost thirty years earlier, enslaved in Newport, Rhode Island, for nearly twenty years, a free man for ten, he was returning to Africa. He left fragmentary clues buried in archives on three continents which illuminate an “ordinary” […]