In the summer of 1776, the average British soldier was 28 years old with seven years experience in the Army. The average American soldier was 20 and had known military life for only six months.
In his first year as president he received 1,881 letters, not including internal correspondence from his cabinet, and sent out 677 letters of his own. This
As far as his contemporaries were concerned, there was no question about his stature in American history. In the extravaganza of mourning that occurred in more than four hundred towns and hamlets thro...
Antislavery idealists might prefer to live in some better world, which like all such places was too good to be true. The American nation in 1790, however, was a real world, laden with legacies like sl...
Though many historians have taken a compromise or split-the-different position over the ensuing years, the basic choice has remained constant, as historians have declared themselves Jeffersonian or Ha...
The second is the military narrative of the battles on Long Island and Manhattan, where the British army and navy delivered a series of devastating defeats to an American army of amateurs, but missed...
He found himself in the ironic position of being the indispensable man in a political world that regarded all leaders as disposable.
The fledgling and ragtag American army turned its state into a semi-plausible advantage, encouraging enlistees to wear their own "hunting shirts" to build on the reputation of frontier marksmen.
The second paragraph of the Declaration that is very much an expression of Jefferson’s imagination. It envisions a perfect world, at last bereft of kings, priests, and even government itself. In this...
In time to come be shaped by the human mind. Asked
They are, from this period, to be considered as Actors on a most conspicuous Theatre, which seems to be peculiarly designated by Providence for the display of human greatness and felicity.
There was in Madison’s critical assessment of the state governments a discernible antidemocratic ethos rooted in the conviction that political popularity generated a toxic chemistry of appeasement and...
His massive probity, combined with his persistent geniality, made him impossible to hate. He lacked Washington’s gravitas, Hamilton’s charisma, and Madison’s cerebral power, but he more than compensat...
Having now finished the work assigned me, Washington solemnly said, I retire from the great theatre of Action....I here offer my Commission, and take leave of all the enjoyments of public life. The ma...
William Pitt, Earl of Chatham, the acknowledged architect of the British victory in the French and Indian War, rose to condemn the decision to militarize the conflict. He recommended the withdrawal fr...
The old adage applied: if God were in the details, Colonel Washington would have been there to greet him upon arrival.
In psychological terms, he was neurotic and she was uncommonly sane. His inevitable eruptions would not threaten the marriage, because she was the center who would always hold.
First, the achievement of the revolutionary generation was a collective enterprise that succeeded because of the diversity of personalities and ideologies present in the mix. Their interactions and ju...
The land of opportunity, where credentials mattered less than demonstrated ability.
Creation: If I could not go to heaven but with a party, proclaimed Thomas Jefferson, I would not go there at all.1