July 4th

As you celebrate the beginning of a nation, learn something about the war that started this country. It was not what you think it was.

You would never accept a book about science if you knew it ignored new research. Historians leave out important truths about the 1770's when writing new books every year to capitalize on Independence Day book sales.

The truth is that what saved the Patriots that lead the rag tag militia in the 13 colonies from defeat are the tactical mistakes made by British generals. Battlefield successes and Britain’s heavy-handed tactics may have boosted the Patriots’ appeal in the eyes of the regular folk up and down the east coast, but it’s misleading to say the fight to win "freedom" from the British taxman was popular among everyday people.

"To gain supporters, local patriot leaders often relied on fear and intimidation, not appeals to hearts and minds. In most towns, for instance, patriots created vigilante groups, called Committees of Safety, that forced colonists to take loyalty oaths, swearing to turn in anyone deemed suspicious. During the war, in other words, colonial America may have felt more like the Soviet Union than a free and open republic.

Civilians' anger had a lot to do with outrage the British caused when they incited Indian tribes against the colonists. And it had much to do with Britain’s decision to arm slaves in exchange for their freedom.

Take what happened in Virginia, where the war was ultimately won. Wealthy planters were happy to champion liberty, and a draft, so long as their lives weren’t put on the line. They paid poorer men to fight for them.

Rioters against the draft demanded a volunteer militia, but at a high price. Volunteers wanted land as payment, and, just as importantly, slaves to cultivate that land. Virginia’s elites conceded, confiscating slaves from abandoned loyalist plantations and promising Native American lands that the British would lose when the war ended.

Even still, when the patriots won at Yorktown, Va., in 1781, the battle that ended the war, Virginia’s militia made up only 20 percent of the patriots’ 15,000 troops. The Continental Army, most of them northerners, provided about one-third, and more than one-half were French.

Perhaps there’s a lesson we could learn from the Revolution’s losers, the British. They took on what looked like an easy war abroad to patch over partisan divisions at home (hear that Bush, Bush, Cheney and Obama) yet nonetheless didn't win the war because of imperial overreach. 

Or perhaps we could learn something from the vast majority of ambivalent colonists, the ones unsure whether the war was even worth it. The Revolution scared them and held false promises. Their experience provides a sobering lesson about the hubris of war.

But, yes, of course, we should still be thankful on July 4th. I just like to remind you of how history keeps repeating itself as you chow down burgers and swig beer, and wait for the fireworks.

Content herein based on:

Slate ..... Revolution Blues: 

Why do popular histories of the War of Independence ignore modern scholarship? By Eric Herschthal

Revolutionary Summer: The Birth of American Independence by Joseph Ellis. Knopf.

Our Lives, Our Fortunes, Our Sacred Honor: The Forging of American Independence, 1774-1776 by Richard Beeman. Basic Books.

Bunker Hill: A City, a Siege, a Revolution by Nathaniel Philbrick. Viking.