The 1st Rhode Island Regiment, famously known as the “Black Regiment,” is renowned for its key role in helping to repel three enemy charges at the Battle of Rhode Island on August 29, 1778. What is not widely appreciated is that Rhode Island’s two Continental Army regiments were multi-racial before the famous “Black Regiment” was […]
I recently came across the recollections of Simeon Thayer, who served from 1777 to 1781 as a major in Rhode Island Continental Army regiments. He was one of the outstanding military figures from Rhode Island during the war. His recollections start with him as a teenager during the French and Indian War serving in Maj. […]
The Pines Bridge Monument, unveiled on November 17, 2018 in Yorktown Heights, New York, is the first Revolutionary War memorial to depict a white American, an African American, and a Native American uniting with each other against enemy forces.[1] In an era when existing monuments, such as that of the Albany icon General Philip Schuyler, […]
On this week’s Dispatches, host Brady Crytzer interviews history professor and author Shirley L. Greenabout her new book, Revolutionary Blacks: Discovering the Frank Brothers, Freeborn Men of Color, Soldiers of Independence. New episodes of Dispatchesare available for free every Saturday evening(Eastern United States Time) on iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, Amazon Music, and the JAR Dispatches web site. Dispatchescan now […]
BOOK REVIEW: Revolutionary Blacks, Discovering the Frank Brothers, Freeborn Men of Color, Soldiers of Independence by Shirley L. Green (Yardley, PA: Westholme, 2023) This captivating book tells a new American story. It is the first book to detail the life, challenges, fears and hopes of a Black soldier in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary […]
The American Revolution spurred the world’s first significant movement to abolish slavery and the African slave trade.[1] Before then, there was virtually no antislavery activity in any of the thirteen colonies of North America, or for that matter, anywhere else in the world. There was some limited antislavery dialogue in England, but its abolitionist movement […]
