Land And Allegiance In Revolutionary Georgia

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Land & Allegiance in Revolutionary Georgia

Author : Leslie Hall
Publisher : University of Georgia Press
ISBN 13 : 9780820322629
Total Pages : 260 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (226 download)

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Book Synopsis Land & Allegiance in Revolutionary Georgia by : Leslie Hall

Download or read book Land & Allegiance in Revolutionary Georgia written by Leslie Hall and published by University of Georgia Press. This book was released on 2001-01-01 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This history of the American Revolution in Georgia offers a thorough examination of how landownership issues complicated and challenged colonists’ loyalties. Despite underdevelopment and isolation, eighteenth-century Georgia was an alluring place, for it promised settlers of all social classes the prospect of affordable land--and the status that went with ownership. Then came the Revolution and its many threats to the orderly systems by which property was acquired and protected. As rebel and royal leaders vied for the support of Georgia’s citizens, says Leslie Hall, allegiance became a prime commodity, with property and the preservation of owners’ rights the requisite currency for securing it. As Hall shows, however, the war’s progress in Georgia was indeterminate; in fact, Georgia was the only colony in which British civil government was reestablished during the war. In the face of continued uncertainties--plundering, confiscation, and evacuation--many landowners’ desires for a strong, consistent civil authority ultimately transcended whatever political leanings they might have had. The historical irony here, Hall’s study shows, is that the most successful regime of Georgia’s Revolutionary period was arguably that of royalist governor James Wright. Land and Allegiance in Revolutionary Georgia is a revealing study of the self-interest and practical motivations in competition with a period’s idealism and rhetoric.

Colonial Records of the State of Georgia

Author : Kenneth Coleman
Publisher : University of Georgia Press
ISBN 13 : 0820359092
Total Pages : 327 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (23 download)

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Book Synopsis Colonial Records of the State of Georgia by : Kenneth Coleman

Download or read book Colonial Records of the State of Georgia written by Kenneth Coleman and published by University of Georgia Press. This book was released on 2021-10-15 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Colonial Records of the State of Georgia document the colony through its first twenty-five years and includes correspondence between Georgia founder James Oglethorpe and the Trustees for Establishing the Colony, as well as records pertaining to land grants; agreements and interactions with Indigenous peoples; the settlement of a small Jewish community and the Salzburgers, German-speaking Protestant refugees; and the removal of restrictions on land tenure, rum, and slavery in the colony. Most of the local records of colonial Georgia were destroyed during the Revolution. Under Governor James Wright’s direction, merchant John Graham loaded much of the official records on his vessel in the Savannah River. During the Battle of the Rice Boats in March 1776, the Inverness was burned while it lay at anchor. The destructive civil war that occurred in the latter phases of the Revolution resulted in further destruction. The Colonial Records of the State of Georgia, drawn from archival material in Great Britain, remain a unique source. Volume 27, spanning the years 1754–56, contains the papers of Georgia’s first governor, John Reynolds, as well as the correspondence of various inhabitants. The Georgia Open History Library has been made possible in part by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities: Democracy demands wisdom. Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this collection, do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Colonial Records of the State of Georgia

Author : Kenneth Coleman
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780820359236
Total Pages : 388 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (592 download)

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Book Synopsis Colonial Records of the State of Georgia by : Kenneth Coleman

Download or read book Colonial Records of the State of Georgia written by Kenneth Coleman and published by . This book was released on 2021-10-15 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Colonial Records of the State of Georgia document the colony through its first twenty-five years and includes correspondence between Georgia founder James Oglethorpe and the Trustees for Establishing the Colony, as well as records pertaining to land grants; agreements and interactions with Indigenous peoples; the settlement of a small Jewish community and the Salzburgers, German-speaking Protestant refugees; and the removal on restrictions of land tenure, rum, and slavery in the colony. Most of the local records of colonial Georgia were destroyed during the Revolution. Under Governor James Wright's direction, merchant John Graham loaded much of the official records on his vessel in the Savannah River. During the Battle of the Rice Boats in March 1776, the Inverness was burned while it lay at anchor. The destructive civil war that occurred in the latter phases of the Revolution resulted in further destruction. The Colonial Records of the State of Georgia, drawn from archival material in Great Britain, remain a unique source. Volume 20 concerns the actual founding of Georgia and covers the years 1732-35. It provides background on the settlement and a great deal about the arrival of the colonists and the conditions that they found. Volume 27, spanning the years 1754-56, contains the papers of Georgia's first governor, John Reynolds, as well as the correspondence of various inhabitants. Volume 28, Part I, contains the papers of governors John Reynolds, Henry Ellis, and James Wright from 1757 to 1763. Volume 28, Part II includes the papers of Governor James Wright, acting governor James Habersham, and others. Volume 29 contains the Trustees' Letter Book, 1732-1738. Volume 30 contains the Trustees' Letter Book, 1738-1745 Volume 31 contains the Trustees' Letter Book, 1745-1752 Volume 32 includes entry books of commissions, powers, instructions, leases, grants of land, and other documents by the Trustees.

Recollections of a Georgia Loyalist

Author : Elizabeth Lichtenstein Johnston
Publisher : New York : M.F. Mansfield & Company
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 250 pages
Book Rating : 4.A/5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis Recollections of a Georgia Loyalist by : Elizabeth Lichtenstein Johnston

Download or read book Recollections of a Georgia Loyalist written by Elizabeth Lichtenstein Johnston and published by New York : M.F. Mansfield & Company. This book was released on 1901 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Atlantic Loyalties

Author : Francis Andrew McMichael
Publisher : University of Georgia Press
ISBN 13 : 0820336505
Total Pages : 241 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (23 download)

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Book Synopsis Atlantic Loyalties by : Francis Andrew McMichael

Download or read book Atlantic Loyalties written by Francis Andrew McMichael and published by University of Georgia Press. This book was released on 2008-01-01 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Integrating social, cultural, economic, and political history, this is a study of the factors that grounded--or swayed--the loyalties of non-Spaniards living under Spanish rule on the southern frontier. In particular, Andrew McMichael looks at the colonial Spanish administration’s attitude toward resident Americans. The Spanish borderlands systems of slavery and land ownership, McMichael shows, used an efficient system of land distribution and government patronage that engendered loyalty and withstood a series of conflicts that tested, but did not shatter, residents’ allegiance. McMichael focuses on the Baton Rouge district of Spanish West Florida from 1785 through 1810, analyzing why resident Anglo-Americans, who had maintained a high degree of loyalty to the Spanish Crown through 1809, rebelled in 1810. The book contextualizes the 1810 rebellion, and by extension the southern frontier, within the broader Atlantic World, showing how both local factors as well as events in Europe affected lives in the Spanish borderlands. Breaking with traditional scholarship, McMichael examines contests over land and slaves as a determinant of loyalty. He draws on Spanish, French, and Anglo records to challenge scholarship that asserts a particularly “American” loyalty on the frontier whereby Anglo-American residents in West Florida, as disaffected subjects of the Spanish Crown, patiently abided until they could overthrow an alien system. Rather, it was political, social, and cultural conflicts--not nationalist ideology--that disrupted networks by which economic prosperity was gained and thus loyalty retained.

The American Revolution in Georgia, 1763–1789

Author : Kenneth Coleman
Publisher : University of Georgia Press
ISBN 13 : 0820359718
Total Pages : 365 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (23 download)

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Book Synopsis The American Revolution in Georgia, 1763–1789 by : Kenneth Coleman

Download or read book The American Revolution in Georgia, 1763–1789 written by Kenneth Coleman and published by University of Georgia Press. This book was released on 2021-10-15 with total page 365 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The American Revolution in Georgia explores the political, economic, and social impacts of the American Revolution throughout the state of Georgia. In this detailed historical study, Kenneth Coleman describes the events leading up to the Revolution, the fighting years of war, and the years of readjustment after independence became a reality for the United States. Coleman investigates how these events impacted Georgia’s history forever, from the rise of discontent between 1764 and 1774 to the fighting after the siege in Savannah between 1779 and 1782 and changes in interstate affairs between 1782 to 1789, and more. The American Revolution in Georgia contributes to the complicated history of the American Revolution and its impacts on the South. The Georgia Open History Library has been made possible in part by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities: Democracy demands wisdom. Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this collection, do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

David Humphreys' Life of General Washington

Author : David Humphreys
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780820312934
Total Pages : 129 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (129 download)

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Book Synopsis David Humphreys' Life of General Washington by : David Humphreys

Download or read book David Humphreys' Life of General Washington written by David Humphreys and published by . This book was released on 1991 with total page 129 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The biography of Washington written by his close friend and military aide

From Empire to Revolution

Author : Greg Brooking
Publisher : University of Georgia Press
ISBN 13 : 0820365963
Total Pages : 354 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (23 download)

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Book Synopsis From Empire to Revolution by : Greg Brooking

Download or read book From Empire to Revolution written by Greg Brooking and published by University of Georgia Press. This book was released on 2024 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "From Empire to Revolution is the first biography devoted to an in-depth examination of the life and conflicted career of Sir James Wright (1716-1785). Greg Brooking uses Wright's life as a means to better understand the complex struggle for power in both colonial Georgia and the larger British Empire. James Wright lived a transatlantic life, taking advantage of every imperial opportunity afforded him. He earned numerous important government posts and amassed an incredible fortune, totaling over £100,000 sterling. An English-born grandson of Chief Justice Sir Robert Wright, James Wright was raised in Charleston, South Carolina following his father's appointment as that colony's chief justice. Young James served South Carolina in a number of capacities, public and ecclesiastical, prior to his admittance to London's famed Gray's Inn to study law. Most notably, he was appointed South Carolina's attorney general and colonial agent to London prior to his gubernatorial appointment in Georgia in 1761. His long imperial career delicately balanced dual loyalties to Crown and colony and offers a crucial lens on loyalism and the American Revolution that also connects a number of contexts important in recent early American and British scholarship, including imperial and Atlantic history, Indigenous borderlands, race and slavery, and popular politics"--

Coastal Encounters

Author : Richmond Forrest Brown
Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
ISBN 13 : 0803262671
Total Pages : 327 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (32 download)

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Book Synopsis Coastal Encounters by : Richmond Forrest Brown

Download or read book Coastal Encounters written by Richmond Forrest Brown and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2007-01-01 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Coastal Encounters opens a window onto the fascinating world of the eighteenth-century Gulf South. Stretching from Florida to Texas, the region witnessed the complex collision of European, African, and Native American peoples. The Gulf South offered an extraordinary stage for European rivalries to play out, allowed a Native-based frontier exchange system to develop alongside an emerging slave-based plantation economy, and enabled the construction of an urban network of unusual opportunity for free people of color. After being long-neglected in favor of the English colonies of the Atlantic coast, the colonial Gulf South has now become the focus of new and exciting scholarship. ø Coastal Encounters brings together leading experts and emerging scholars to provide a portrait of the Gulf South in the eighteenth century. The contributors depict the remarkable transformations that took place?demographic, cultural, social, political, and economic?and examine the changes from multiple perspectives, including those of Native Americans, Europeans, and Africans; colonizers and colonized; men and women. The outstanding essays in this book argue for the central place of this dynamic region in colonial history.

Of One Mind and of One Government

Author : Kevin Kokomoor
Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
ISBN 13 : 1496212339
Total Pages : 646 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (962 download)

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Book Synopsis Of One Mind and of One Government by : Kevin Kokomoor

Download or read book Of One Mind and of One Government written by Kevin Kokomoor and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2019-02 with total page 646 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Of One Mind and Of One Government Kevin Kokomoor examines the formation of Creek politics and nationalism from the 1770s through the Red Stick War, when the aftermath of the American Revolution and the beginnings of American expansionism precipitated a crisis in Creek country. The state of Georgia insisted that the Creeks sign three treaties to cede tribal lands. The Creeks objected vigorously, igniting a series of border conflicts that escalated throughout the late eighteenth century and hardened partisan lines between pro-American, pro-Spanish, and pro-British Creeks and their leaders. Creek politics shifted several times through historical contingencies, self-interests, changing leadership, and debate about how to best preserve sovereignty, a process that generated national sentiment within the nascent and imperfect Creek Nation. Based on original archival research and a revisionist interpretation, Kokomoor explores how the state of Georgia's increasingly belligerent and often fraudulent land acquisitions forced the Creeks into framing a centralized government, appointing heads of state, and assuming the political and administrative functions of a nation-state. Prior interpretations have viewed the Creeks as a loose confederation of towns, but the formation of the Creek Nation brought predictability, stability, and reduced military violence in its domain during the era.

Georgia's Frontier Women

Author : Ben Marsh
Publisher : University of Georgia Press
ISBN 13 : 0820343404
Total Pages : 270 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (23 download)

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Book Synopsis Georgia's Frontier Women by : Ben Marsh

Download or read book Georgia's Frontier Women written by Ben Marsh and published by University of Georgia Press. This book was released on 2012-06-01 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ranging from Georgia's founding in the 1730s until the American Revolution in the 1770s, Georgia's Frontier Women explores women's changing roles amid the developing demographic, economic, and social circumstances of the colony's settling. Georgia was launched as a unique experiment on the borderlands of the British Atlantic world. Its female population was far more diverse than any in nearby colonies at comparable times in their formation. Ben Marsh tells a complex story of narrowing opportunities for Georgia's women as the colony evolved from uncertainty toward stability in the face of sporadic warfare, changes in government, land speculation, and the arrival of slaves and immigrants in growing numbers. Marsh looks at the experiences of white, black, and Native American women-old and young, married and single, working in and out of the home. Mary Musgrove, who played a crucial role in mediating colonist-Creek relations, and Marie Camuse, a leading figure in Georgia's early silk industry, are among the figures whose life stories Marsh draws on to illustrate how some frontier women broke down economic barriers and wielded authority in exceptional ways. Marsh also looks at how basic assumptions about courtship, marriage, and family varied over time. To early settlers, for example, the search for stability could take them across race, class, or community lines in search of a suitable partner. This would change as emerging elites enforced the regulation of traditional social norms and as white relationships with blacks and Native Americans became more exploitive and adversarial. Many of the qualities that earlier had distinguished Georgia from other southern colonies faded away.

John Adams's Republic

Author : Richard Alan Ryerson
Publisher : JHU Press
ISBN 13 : 1421419238
Total Pages : 571 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (214 download)

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Book Synopsis John Adams's Republic by : Richard Alan Ryerson

Download or read book John Adams's Republic written by Richard Alan Ryerson and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 2016-09-15 with total page 571 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This trailblazing study explores Adams’s political thought across his entire career in law and public service. Winner of the Sally and Morris Lasky Prize of The Center for Political History Lebanon Velley College Scholars have examined John Adams’s writings and beliefs for generations, but no one has brought such impressive credentials to the task as Richard Alan Ryerson in John Adams’s Republic. The editor-in-chief of the Massachusetts Historical Society’s Adams Papers project for nearly two decades, Ryerson offers readers of this magisterial book a fresh, firmly grounded account of Adams’s political thought and its development. Of all the founding fathers, Ryerson argues, John Adams may have worried the most about the problem of social jealousy and political conflict in the new republic. Ryerson explains how these concerns, coupled with Adams’s concept of executive authority and his fear of aristocracy, deeply influenced his political mindset. He weaves together a close analysis of Adams’s public writings, a comprehensive chronological narrative beginning in the 1760s, and an exploration of the second president’s private diary, manuscript autobiography, and personal and family letters, revealing Adams’s most intimate political thoughts across six decades. How, Adams asked, could a self-governing country counter the natural power and influence of wealthy elites and their friends in government? Ryerson argues that he came to believe a strong executive could hold at bay the aristocratic forces that posed the most serious dangers to a republican society. The first study ever published to closely examine all of Adams’s political writings, from his youth to his long retirement, John Adams’s Republic should appeal to everyone who seeks to know more about America’s first major political theorist.

Atlantic Loyalties

Author : Andrew McMichael
Publisher : University of Georgia Press
ISBN 13 : 0820369683
Total Pages : 241 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (23 download)

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Book Synopsis Atlantic Loyalties by : Andrew McMichael

Download or read book Atlantic Loyalties written by Andrew McMichael and published by University of Georgia Press. This book was released on 2010-01-25 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Integrating social, cultural, economic, and political history, this is a study of the factors that grounded—or swayed—the loyalties of non-Spaniards living under Spanish rule on the southern frontier. In particular, Andrew McMichael looks at the colonial Spanish administration’s attitude toward resident Americans. The Spanish borderlands systems of slavery and land ownership, McMichael shows, used an efficient system of land distribution and government patronage that engendered loyalty and withstood a series of conflicts that tested, but did not shatter, residents’ allegiance. McMichael focuses on the Baton Rouge district of Spanish West Florida from 1785 through 1810, analyzing why resident Anglo-Americans, who had maintained a high degree of loyalty to the Spanish Crown through 1809, rebelled in 1810. The book contextualizes the 1810 rebellion, and by extension the southern frontier, within the broader Atlantic World, showing how both local factors as well as events in Europe affected lives in the Spanish borderlands. Breaking with traditional scholarship, McMichael examines contests over land and slaves as a determinant of loyalty. He draws on Spanish, French, and Anglo records to challenge scholarship that asserts a particularly “American” loyalty on the frontier whereby Anglo-American residents in West Florida, as disaffected subjects of the Spanish Crown, patiently abided until they could overthrow an alien system. Rather, it was political, social, and cultural conflicts—not nationalist ideology—that disrupted networks by which economic prosperity was gained and thus loyalty retained.

"Going Down Hill"

Author : Harry M. Ward
Publisher : Academica Press,LLC
ISBN 13 : 1933146575
Total Pages : 365 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (331 download)

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Book Synopsis "Going Down Hill" by : Harry M. Ward

Download or read book "Going Down Hill" written by Harry M. Ward and published by Academica Press,LLC. This book was released on 2009 with total page 365 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book discusses the legacies of American Revolutionary War in the context of growing American imperial hubris, overreach and permanent war abroad as well as economic and social decay of American homeland. It discusses the less admirable and tragic implications of a national war/civil war that drove many thousands of Americans from their country, destroyed numerous Native American societies, enshrined human slavery in its constitution and lead to several tragic and bloody existential crises in 19th and 20th century American history.

The Encyclopedia of the Wars of the Early American Republic, 1783–1812 [3 volumes]

Author : Spencer C. Tucker
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 2782 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (16 download)

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Book Synopsis The Encyclopedia of the Wars of the Early American Republic, 1783–1812 [3 volumes] by : Spencer C. Tucker

Download or read book The Encyclopedia of the Wars of the Early American Republic, 1783–1812 [3 volumes] written by Spencer C. Tucker and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2014-06-11 with total page 2782 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Relatively little attention has been paid to American military history between 1783 and 1812—arguably the most formative years of the United States. This encyclopedia fills the void in existing literature and provides greater understanding of how the nation evolved during this era. This encyclopedia offers a comprehensive examination of U.S. military history from the beginning of the republic in 1783 up to the eve of war with Great Britain in 1812. It enables a detailed study of the Early Republic, during which ideological and political divisions occurred over the fledgling U.S. military. The entries cover all the important battles, key individuals, weapons, Indian nations, and treaties, as well as numerous social, political, cultural, and economic developments during this period. The contents of the work will enable readers at the high school, college, university, and even graduate level to comprehend how political parties emerged, and how ideological differences over the organization, size, and use of the military developed. Larger global developments, including Anglo-American and Franco-American interactions, relations between Middle Eastern states and the United States, and relations and warfare between the U.S. government and various Indian nations are also detailed. The extensive and detailed bibliographies will be immensely helpful to learners at all levels.

The Fragile Fabric of Union

Author : Brian D. Schoen
Publisher : JHU Press
ISBN 13 : 0801897815
Total Pages : 384 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (18 download)

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Book Synopsis The Fragile Fabric of Union by : Brian D. Schoen

Download or read book The Fragile Fabric of Union written by Brian D. Schoen and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 2009-10-01 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner, 2010 Bennett H. Wall Award, Southern Historical Association In this fresh study Brian Schoen views the Deep South and its cotton industry from a global perspective, revisiting old assumptions and providing new insights into the region, the political history of the United States, and the causes of the Civil War. Schoen takes a unique and broad approach. Rather than seeing the Deep South and its planters as isolated from larger intellectual, economic, and political developments, he places the region firmly within them. In doing so, he demonstrates that the region’s prominence within the modern world—and not its opposition to it—indelibly shaped Southern history. The place of “King Cotton” in the sectional thinking and budding nationalism of the Lower South seems obvious enough, but Schoen reexamines the ever-shifting landscape of international trade from the 1780s through the eve of the Civil War. He argues that the Southern cotton trade was essential to the European economy, seemingly worth any price for Europeans to protect and maintain, and something to defend aggressively in the halls of Congress. This powerful association gave the Deep South the confidence to ultimately secede from the Union. By integrating the history of the region with global events, Schoen reveals how white farmers, planters, and merchants created a “Cotton South,” preserved its profitability for many years, and ensured its dominance in the international raw cotton markets. The story he tells reveals the opportunities and costs of cotton production for the Lower South and the United States.

The Will of the People

Author : T. H. Breen
Publisher : Harvard University Press
ISBN 13 : 0674242068
Total Pages : 273 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (742 download)

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Book Synopsis The Will of the People by : T. H. Breen

Download or read book The Will of the People written by T. H. Breen and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2019-09-17 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Important and lucidly written...The American Revolution involved not simply the wisdom of a few great men but the passions, fears, and religiosity of ordinary people.” —Gordon S. Wood In this boldly innovative work, T. H. Breen spotlights a crucial missing piece in the stories we tell about the American Revolution. From New Hampshire to Georgia, it was ordinary people who became the face of resistance. Without them the Revolution would have failed. They sustained the commitment to independence when victory seemed in doubt and chose law over vengeance when their communities teetered on the brink of anarchy. The Will of the People offers a vivid account of how, across the thirteen colonies, men and women negotiated the revolutionary experience, accepting huge personal sacrifice, setting up daring experiments in self-government, and going to extraordinary lengths to preserve the rule of law. After the war they avoided the violence and extremism that have compromised so many other revolutions since. A masterful storyteller, Breen recovers the forgotten history of our nation’s true founders. “The American Revolution was made not just on the battlefields or in the minds of intellectuals, Breen argues in this elegant and persuasive work. Communities of ordinary men and women—farmers, workers, and artisans who kept the revolutionary faith until victory was achieved—were essential to the effort.” —Annette Gordon-Reed “Breen traces the many ways in which exercising authority made local committees pragmatic...acting as a brake on the kind of violent excess into which revolutions so easily devolve.” —Wall Street Journal