The phrase “fourteenth colony” describes a province in British North America that did not revolt alongside the original thirteen colonies. Such a province usually had one or more connections to the American Revolution. The phrase is misleading and has been thrown around freely in literature on the Revolutionary era. There have been at least eight […]
There were four bodies that directly influenced England’s relationship with her American colonies; they were the King (a body of one), the Privy Council (advisers to the king), Parliament, and the least known, the Board of Trade and Plantations. This article is about the role and responsibilities of the Board leading up to the accession […]
This article continues an examination of the journal kept by Dr. Edmund Hagen of Scarborough, Maine, begun in “Dispatch’t to America’: the Journal of Dr. Edmund Hagen, Privateer and Prisoner of War.” This second article presents and examines the second half of Dr. Edmund Hagen’s journal, dealing with Hagen’s experience on board the prison ship […]
Queens County of Long Island, New York, had an overwhelming Loyalist population throughout the Revolutionary War period. After the war many Loyalists remained on the island and assimilated into the local population. It is estimated that a large majority of Long Islanders who were loyal and stayed in the United States after the war lost […]
The Consequences of Loyalism: Essays in Honor of Robert M. Calhoon edited by Rebecca Brannon and Joseph S. Moore (University of South Carolina Press, 2019) Anyone who has ever picked up a book concerning Loyalism in the American Revolutionary era has likely encountered the work of Robert M. “Bob” Calhoon. A renowned academic, author, and advisor […]
John Paul Jones has earned enduring fame in American history for his sailing and fighting exploits during the American Revolution. His influence on the war, however, went far beyond his alleged immortal words while engaging the HMS Serapis with his vessel, the Bonhomme Richard. For a period in 1778, the mere mention of his name caused terror […]
Mary Robie, a Massachusetts refugee living in revolutionary Nova Scotia, did not mince words when she criticized her friends for simply “passing thro life” in late May 1783. Despairingly, the nineteen-year-old mocked the tedium of her peers’ routines as fitting for those “whose views extend no higher” than the daily humdrum of Halifax. In Robie’s […]
I read with interest Thomas Fleming’s article, “The Fate of Regulars.” Readers may be interested to know that British soldiers had much better prospects when the conflict ended than their American counterparts. With a professional standing army that had been in existence for nearly 100 years, Great Britain had long since grappled with and resolved […]
