Mary Robie and the Didactic Qualities of Reading Fiction
byMary Robie, a Massachusetts refugee living in revolutionary Nova Scotia, did not mince words when she criticized her friends for simply “passing thro life”…
Loyalists
3
Patriots Against Loyalists on Eastern Long Island, 1775–1776
byIn 1775, within weeks of the violent clashes at Lexington and Concord, Patriots throughout the colonies established Committees of Observation to thwart Loyalists from…
1
William Taylor: Loyalist Refugee in East Florida
byDuring the War for American Independence, displaced Loyalists from the southern colonies sought refuge in East Florida. Due to a large influx of refugees,…
1
Patrick Tonyn: Britain’s Most Effective Revolutionary-Era Royal Governor
byEven among historians of the American Revolution, the name of East Florida’s royal governor, Patrick Tonyn, is all but unknown. However, Tonyn proved himself…
Grace Galloway—Abandoned Loyalist Wife
byGrace Galloway was living in a world of woe. The pressure had been building, and a little after 10 p.m. on August 20, 1778,…
The Loyalist Raid on Newtown: The Consequences of Being Surprised
byThe small village of Newtown played a noteworthy role during the American Revolution from the time when General Washington’s army retreated in 1776 across…
3
Patriots Turned Loyalist—The Experiences of Joseph Galloway and Isaac Low
byIn the American Revolution, as with most other wars, the winners write the history. As such, we have the term “loyalist” for those colonists…
2
Rascally Cousins: Whig or Tory in America’s Mother Town
byWhig or Tory, which side to support in the coming Revolutionary War? Every adult in the thirteen British colonies of North America faced the…
6
North Carolina Patriot Women Who Talked Back to the Tories
byOn January 10, 1776, the British governor of North Carolina, Josiah Martin, then bobbing on the HMS Scorpion off Wilmington, appointed just over two…
1
The Loyalist Guides of Lexington and Concord
byWhen Parliament passed the Boston Port Bill in 1774, in an attempt to break the Massachusetts colonists of their resistance to crown policy, it…
1
The Loyalist Exodus of 1778
byIn March 1778, several hundred South Carolina Loyalists began a march to the British province of East Florida to seek refuge from persecution and…
3
The American Vicars of Bray
byLoyalists, those Americans who openly supported the British Government during the American Revolution, have been largely assumed to have had unchanging allegiance during the…
8
The Loyalist Refugee Experience in Canada
byIn the aftermath of General Burgoyne’s defeat at Saratoga, many Loyalists in the New York and Hampshire Grant regions chose to flee to the…
6
Richard Pearis and the Mobilization of South Carolina’s Backcountry Loyalists
byWhen British Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton began operations against Charleston in March 1780, he decided not to call upon the Loyalists in the…
6
Wrecked in a Thousand Pieces:
Loss of Martha
by
When the Maryland Loyalists, a Provincial regiment, marched out of Philadelphia along with the rest of the British Army in June 1778, it mustered…
16
Top 10 American Loyalist Officers
byMany historical accounts over look the impact of American loyalist military leaders and their revolutionary war contributions to the British cause. 50,000 or more…
4
The Experience of New London Tories
and Quakers
by
On December 8, 1776, British soldiers, supported by a large fleet, easily invaded and occupied Newport, Rhode Island, and the rest of Aquidneck Island. …
1
The Making of a Loyalist
byBy 1773, Creek Indians in Georgia had run up debts with traders far larger than any amount they could pay. The colony pressed the…
6
When were they Patriots and Loyalists?
byAt what point during the American Revolution is it most acceptable to classify colonists as either Patriots or Loyalists? 1776. Before this, many…
1
Searching for Loyalists: Boston Harborfest (part 3)
by“Tory Stories” After attending the “No Tax on Tea!” program at the Old South Meeting House, I walked to nearby King’s Chapel, the first…
5
Establishing the Tory Myth
byOur understanding of loyalists in the American Revolution is a relic of the eighteenth-century turn from what one might call “constitutional sense” to a…
Loyalist Leadership in the Revolutionary South
byThe historical debate concerning the Loyalists in the Revolutionary South has generally focused on matters such as the Loyalists’ numbers and motivations. While these…
1
Portraits of Southern Partisans: Likenesses of Thomas Brown and Elijah Clarke
byThe battles of and between English born merchant Loyalist partisan Thomas Brown and illiterate native North Carolina American guerilla Elijah Clarke lacks for nothing,…
3
The Loser’s Account: A Story of Two Carolina Loyalists
byThey say that history is written by the victors. Thus, the story of the American Revolution is largely one of heroic figures such as…
5
John Adams’s Rule of Thirds
byDear Mr. History: I often hear that John Adams estimated that one-third of Americans supported the Revolution, one-third opposed it, and one-third was neutral. …