75. Memories

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The Revolution has been a source of inspiration to many and contention to others. Let me suggest that anyone wanting to explore how its legacy has been interpreted by posterity would do well to read Michael D. Hattem’s new book, The Memory of ’76: The Revolution in American History (Yale University Press, 2024).

I’d like too share the following excerpt from Hattem’s epilogue (“The Revolution in the New Millennium”):

For nearly two hundred and fifty years, the popular memory of the Revolution has served as the nation’s origin myth. It has provided heroes and stories that have helped generations of Americans create emotional connections to the nation’s founding and often equally emotional definitions of what it means to be an American. The popular memory of the Revolution has been an important vehicle through which Americans have defined and voiced their understanding.of the present and their hopes for the future. Like those of many other older societies, the American origin myth has been consistently contested, as generation after generation has reimagined the Revolution in ways that are most meaningful and useful at the time. As a result, conflicts in American politics and culture over partisanship, regionalism, race, gender, class, ethnicity, and religion have unavoidably shaped and been shaped by the ways in which Americans have remembered and fought over their Revolution. Ultimately, the long history of the popular memory of the Revolution reveals that remembering the nation’s founding has often done far more to divide Americans than it has to unite them. It also reminds us that revising the past is an important and long-standing American political tradition, while this epilogue offers a clear indication that the memory of the Revolution remains a vitally contested part of American life well into the twenty-first century.

As someone once said, history is an argument that never ends. And I think that an essential part of being an American is arguing about what it means to be an American, or—in other words—what the Revolution means today.


This will probably be my last blog post until next year, as I’m working on another article for the Journal of the American Revolution (number 11, but who’s counting?) and expect that to supersede any other literary activity for the time being.

Have a great holiday season, everyone!

74. Veterans Day

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Thinking about today brings to mind the memoir of Joseph Plumb Martin, probably the best known personal account of any left to posterity by an American soldier who served in the War of Independence. In The Battle of Harlem Heights, 1776, I wrote about one scene in particular that is depicted in his narrative, and I’d like too share that excerpt below:

Private Martin illustrated the reality of the common soldier’s
relative anonymity in his recollection of an incident that followed
the Harlem Heights engagement: “A circumstance occurred on
the evening after this action, which although trifling in its nature,
excited in me feelings which I shall never forget. When we came
off the field we brought away a man who had been shot dead
upon the spot; and after we had refreshed ourselves we pro-
ceeded to bury him.” The grave was dug on the grounds of the
Morris house that served as Washington’s headquarters, where
Martin’s party endeavored, “just in the dusk of evening, to com-
mit the poor man, then far from friends and relatives, to the
bosom of his mother earth.”
As soon as they laid him in the ground, “in as decent a posture
as existing circumstances would permit, there came from the
house, towards the grave, two young ladies who appeared to be
sisters;—as they approached the grave, the soldiers immediately
made way for them.” When the women reached “the head of the
grave, they stopped, and with their arms around each other’s
neck, stooped forward and looked into it.” They “asked if we were
going to put the earth upon his naked face,” and when “answered
in the affirmative, one of them took a fine white gauze handker-
chief from her neck” and asked that it be used to cover his face,
as “tears, at the same time, [were] flowing down their cheeks.”
Once the grave was filled, they returned to the house.
Although no one there knew the man being buried, “yet he
had mourners,” Martin writes, heaping praise on this tender-
hearted duo: “Worthy young ladies! You, and such as you, are de-
serving the regard of the greatest of men. What sisters, what wives,
what mothers and what neighbors would you make!—Such a sight
as those ladies afforded at that time, and on that occasion, was
worthy, and doubtless received the attention of angels.” That
affecting moment’s indelible impression on Martin found its way
into his memoir, which was published more than a half-century
later and became one of the best-known primary accounts of
army life in the Revolution.

To any reader who has worn our country’s uniform, thank you for your service.

Upcoming Book Talk

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Some of you may have already received an email about this, but I wanted to let anyone who’s interested know about a talk I’ll be giving at Historic Summerseat in Morrisville, PA—the site of George Washington’s headquarters from December 8 to 14, 1776—focusing on my second book, The Road to Assunpink Creek. This free event will be on Sunday, November 10 at 1 pm. Seating is limited, and reservations can be made by calling 215-801-0753.

73. Lots of Leutze (pronounced “loit-seh”)

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Washington Crossing the Delaware by Emanuel Gottlieb Leutze (1816-1868) is America’s best-known historical painting and one of the most renowned works of art in history. Here are some facts about the painter and his artistry that may be of interest to you:

— Leutze was born in Germany but came to America with his family in 1825. They settled in Philadelphia, but after his father’s death in 1831 the youth had to work to support his mother and sister, which he did by selling his portraiture. Recognizing Leutze’s talent, several wealthy benefactors elected to subsidize his artistic education by sending him across the Atlantic to study in his native land, where he enrolled in 1841 in the Dusseldorf Academy, then the preeminent school of art in Europe.

— The artist began work on this, his most celebrated painting in 1849 at his Dusseldorf studio, in the wake of the Revolutions of 1848 that he passionately supported. These included a series of republican revolts against European monarchies, beginning in Sicily and spreading to France, Germany, Italy, and the Austrian Empire, but which all resulted in failure and repression. Leutze utilized American tourists and art students in Europe as models and assistants in his creative process.

— The original version of this painting was damaged by a fire in Leutze’s studio in late 1850, when it was nearly finished, and subsequently hung in an art museum in Bremen, Germany (the Bremen Kunsthalle), only to fall victim to a bombing raid by the British Royal Air Force on September 5, 1942. This led to historian David Hackett Fischer’s droll observation that the RAF perpetrated Great Britain’s final act of revenge for the American Revolution.

— Leutze created another full-sized copy of the painting (12 by 21 feet), which was shipped to America in 1851, where it was seen by over fifty thousand people in New York before being exhibited in the Rotunda of the National Capitol. During the Civil War, it served to raise funds for the Union cause and the antislavery movement, entirely fitting in light of Leutze’s ardent abolitionist sentiments—which are reflected in the presence of a Black soldier whom he positioned in the boat next to Washington.

— In 1897, private art collector John S. Kennedy, a trustee and vice president of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan, bought the painting for sixteen thousand dollars and donated it to the museum, where it remained until 1950, when the Met loaned the work out to the Museum of Fine Art in Dallas, Texas. From 1952 to 1970, Leutze’s creation was displayed at Washington Crossing State Park in Pennsylvania—renamed as Washington Crossing Historic Park in 1979—first in the local Methodist Episcopal Church and after the summer of 1959 in the park’s new Memorial Building (now the Visitor Center). By one estimate, two hundred and fifty thousand people visited every year for a decade to view Leutze’s handiwork. In 1969, the Met formally recalled its loan of the painting to the park and brought it back in time for the nation’s Bicentennial to grace the museum’s American Wing. (During its prior residency there, the painting hung in one of the European painting galleries rather than the American Wing, perhaps because it was considered a German, rather than American, work.) The regal canvas and its imposing frame reside there today, at 1000 5th Avenue, inside Central Park, opposite 83rd Street.

— Since the original painting left Washington Crossing, it has been replaced by a series of reproductions that grace the Visitor Center auditorium (the first time the Met ever granted permission for a copy to be made of a painting in its collection). These have included: in 1970, an oil painting by Robert Williams commissioned by Ann Hawkes Hutton, founder and chair of the Washington Crossing Foundation’s board of directors and author of a book about Leutze and his magnum opus; in 1998, a digital copy of the original painting produced by Muralite Murals of St. Paul, Minnesota; and in 2013, a new digital copy created by Forbes Associates of Edgely, Pennsylvania, from a digital image owned by the Met.

— The painting is undoubtedly the most prominent and arguably the least accurate depiction of the legendary Christmas night 1776 Delaware River crossing by Washington’s army. For starters, the river is too wide (it’s the Rhine, not the Delaware), the sky is too light (they crossed at night), the ice is in the form of bluish chunks (Delaware River ice is typically flat and white), the flag is wrong (“Old Glory” was not adopted by Congress as the first flag of the United States until June 14, 1777—which is why June 14 is Flag Day), the boat is too small (about one-third the size of the Durham boats used to carry the American infantry across the river), and Washington looks older than age 44, which he was at the time. (His image is based on a bust by the French sculptor Jean Antoine Houdon that was created a decade later and is thought to be the best likeness we have of GW.) It seems safe to assume that the artist’s intent was to execute his canvas in the classical tradition of great historical paintings that seek to leave viewers with a dramatic impression, rather than to portray an event as it might have actually occurred.

— On the other hand, Leutze brilliantly captures the sense of fierce urgency that informed this difficult and hazardous undertaking. His image of the crossing has resonated with generations of viewers worldwide in a way that no other has because he, better than anyone else, conveys the emotions that infused the rebel soldiers and their commander-in-chief at a perilous moment in the quest for American independence, on a night when Washington decided to roll the dice on a last-ditch gamble to save his army and perhaps the revolutionary enterprise. One can clearly discern the courage, determination, desperation, and commitment to a common purpose that drove these weary but resolute warriors across an ice-choked river to their rendezvous with an uncertain fate—a motley assortment of humble citizen-soldiers crowded into Leutze’s tiny craft and all rowing together, metaphorically if not literally. Those feelings are indelibly etched in the faces and postures of these men in such a way as to rivet viewers’ attention and perhaps make them feel as if they’ve been thrust into the boat as well.

— And yes, Washington would have been standing in the boat. In fact, they all would have been (another inaccuracy in the painting). There were no seats in a Durham—or, for that matter, in a ferry boat if that’s what brought him across; and besides, on a night when the bottom of each boat was cold and wet from freezing precipitation, so would a soldier’s bottom have been if he sat in the boat.

So that’s one bottom line, but here’s another: the genius of Emanuel Leutze is dramatically captured in his universally recognized masterwork, which may well be more renowned than the event it celebrates. He forged a majestic billboard for democracy that enduringly proclaims to people from across the globe a spirited vision of freedom and the resolve to achieve it.

Get the picture?

Sources:

David Hackett Fischer, Washington’s Crossing (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004).

Barbara S. Groseclose, Emanuel Leutze, 1816-1868: Freedom Is the Only King (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1975).

Anne Hawkes Hutton, Portrait of Patriotism (Philadelphia: Chilton Company, 1959).

Peter Osborne, No Far Spot In This Land Is More Immortalized: A History of Pennsylvania’s Washington Crossing Historic Park (Yardley, PA: Yardley Press, 2014).

John Haslet and the Delaware Regiment Revisited

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This continues the thread from my last several posts, which each included a link to an interview about one of my books with Randolph G. (Randy) Flood, host of the The Real American Revolution Multimedia Center and Consortium for Civic Education.

For anyone who’s interested, here’s a link to a video recording of the final segment in this series—a discussion about John Haslet’s World.

BTW, the above image is of a private in Haslet’s Delaware Regiment in 1776, created by Charles M. Lefferts, c.1910, for his study of uniforms in the Revolution and published by the New York Historical Society in 1926.

USPS puts its Stamp on the 250th

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The United States Postal Service has just unveiled a new Forever Stamp to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the First Continental Congress, which convened at Carpenters’ Hall in Philadelphia on September 5, 1774, and you can read about it here.

Letting Another Chat Out of the Bag

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This is another in a series of posts focusing on recent interviews about my books with Randolph G. (Randy) Flood, who hosts The Real American Revolution Multimedia Center and Consortium for Civic Education.

For anyone who’s interested, here’s a link to a video recording of my third interview with Randy, this one on August 21 about The Battle of Harlem Heights, 1776. This was my fourth book and is part of the Westholme Small Battles series. (BTW the 248th anniversary of this event—depicted above by Alonzo Chappel—occurs in less than two weeks, on September 16.)

Randy and I will be having one more exchange, this one about John Haslet’s World, very soon. I’ll provide a link to that video when it becomes available.

Listen Up (if you want to)

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As you may recall, my last post included a link to an interview I had about my second book, The Road to Assunpink Creek, with Randolph G. (Randy) Flood, who hosts The Real American Revolution Multimedia Center and Consortium for Civic Education.

For anyone who’s interested, here’s a link to a video recording of my interview with Randy about my next book, Winning the Ten Crucial Days. This interview actually preceded the above, but the video required a few edits that delayed its availability until now.

If you’d like to read more about the new book (including reviewer comments), and/or are thinking about preordering, you can do so at Brookline BooksAmazon, Barnes & Noble—or, if you want to support a historic site (sure, you do), the Fort Plain Museum.

Enjoy the rest of your summer – stay safe and healthy.

That’s Creek to Me

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For anyone who’s interested, a video recording of my recent interview with Randolph G. Flood, Host of The Real American Revolution Multimedia Center and Consortium for Civic Education, which focused on the significance of the Battle of Assunpink Creek (or Second Battle of Trenton), is available here.

72. So on and so Fourth . . .

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The following is from George Washington’s General Orders of July 9, 1776 to his troops announcing the Declaration of Independence, which were issued as the rebel army in New York City awaited an expected assault by the forces of the British crown gathering on Staten Island:

The Honorable the Continental Congress, impelled by the dictates of duty, policy and necessity, having been pleased to dissolve the connection which subsisted between this Country, and Great Britain, and to declare the United Colonies of North America, free and independent STATES: The several brigades are to be drawn up this evening on their respective Parades, at six OClock, when the Declaration of Congress, shewing the grounds & reasons of this measure, is to be read with an audible voice.

The General hopes this important Event will serve as an incentive to every officer, and soldier, to act with Fidelity and Courage, as knowing that now the peace and safety of his Country depends (under God) solely on the success of our arms: And that he is now in the service of a State, possessed of sufficient power to reward his merit, and advance him to the highest Honors of a free Country…

On that same day in New York City, a mob, inspired by Congress’s declaration, toppled the equestrian statue of King George III on Bowling Green. Its lead contents would be repurposed, according to Lieutenant Isaac Bangs of Massachusetts, “to be run up into Musquet Balls for the use of the Yankies.” The fact that the unruly crowd utilized a number of enslaved persons to dismantle the statue—acting in the cause of the colonists’ cherished liberty against a detested symbol of the English monarchy—vividly illustrates the stark contradiction that existed between their revolution in support of self-determination and the chattel slavery that constituted America’s most iniquitous institution.

On July 6, Colonel John Haslet of the Delaware Continental Regiment wrote his friend and political ally Caesar Rodney, a member of Congress who had voted for independence, to offer his endorsement of the Revolutionary edict: “I congratulate you, Sir, on the Important Day, which restores to Every American his Birthright—a day which Every Freeman will record with Gratitude, & the Millions of Posterity read with Rapture.”

Not surprisingly, Ambrose Serle had a somewhat different take on this congressional action. Writing in his journal on July 13, the private secretary to Admiral Richard, Lord Howe—who would command His Majesty’s fleet in the impending 1776 New York campaign—opined as follows:

The Congress have at length thought it convenient to throw off the Mask. Their Declaration of the 4th of July, while it avows their Right to Independence, is founded upon such Reasons only, as prove that Independence to have been their Object from the Beginning. A more impudent, false and atrocious Proclamation was never fabricated by the Hands of Man. Hitherto, they had thrown all the Blame and Insult upon the Parliament and ministry: Now, they have the Audacity to calumniate the King and People of Great Britain. ‘Tis impossible to read this Paper, without Horror at the daring Hypocrisy of these Men, who call GOD to witness the uprightness of their Proceedings, nor without Indignation at the low and scurrilous Pretences by wch they attempt to justify themselves. Surely, Providence will honor its own Truth and Justice upon this Occasion, and, as they have made an appeal to it for Success, reward them after their own Deservings.

Gee, I sure wish he didn’t sugarcoat it like that. I want to know what he really thought.

Best wishes for an enjoyable Fourth.