Benjamin A. Railton's Blog, page 14

June 20, 2025: American Nazis: Neo-Nazis and Charlottesville

[In the summerof 1945, Nazi scientists began arriving in the United States, recruited towork in the US government and eventuallyits space program as part of OperationPaperclip. But they weren’t the first nor the only American Nazis by anymeans, and this week I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of others, leading up to a weekendpost on an interesting and fraught recent cultural representation of Paperclip.]

On how torespond to a resurgent neo-Nazi movement. [NOTE: I originally shared this posta few years back; let’s just it hasn’t becomeless relevant since.]

TheAmerican neo-Nazi movement has been present for more than half a century—in thesame mid-1960s years that Tom Lehrer was releasing “Wernher von Braun,” adishonorably discharged Navy veteran named GeorgeLincoln Rockwell founded the AmericanNazi Party (ANP), and the organization has been active in American politicsever since (despite Rockwell’s August1967 murder by disgruntled former ANP member John Patler). Over those decadesit has also spawned competing organizations such as MatthiasKoehl’s New Order, a monthly magazine (The Stormtrooper), and abriefly active 1970s youth organization (the NationalSocialist Liberation Front, or NSLF). Reading all the info in thosehyperlinked posts (none of which, to be clear, are from the organizationsthemselves) makes me want to take a shower, but it’s important not to look awayfrom the fact that American Nazis have been a vocal political force (if ofcourse a minority one) for more than 50 years.

In August2017, however, almost exactly 50 years after Rockwell’s murder, neo-Nazisenjoyed their moment of greatest national visibility: the August11-12 white supremacist “Unite the Right” rallies in myhometown of Charlottesville. The single most famous neo-Nazi participant inthose hateful rallies was James Fields, thedomestic terrorist who drove his car into a crowd of protesters, killing HeatherHeyer. But while neo-Nazis might want to disavow Fields’ blatantlyillegal action, I’m sure they were much happier with the Friday evening marchand rally on the University of Virginia grounds, at which neo-Nazis sportingswastikas and offering Hitler salutes chanted slogans such as “Blood and soil”and “Jews willnot replace us!” By emphasizing the presence of neo-Nazis at the rallies, I don’tmean to downplay the many other white supremacist forces there, nor quitefrankly the centrality of these communities to mainstream 2010s right-wingAmerican politics (there’s a reason why President Trump argued for “very finepeople on both sides” in Charlottesville). But while white supremacist rhetoricand violence has been a common thread in Charlottesvilleand American history, the overt embrace of Nazism in this momentfelt distinctly new and even more threatening still.

So how dowe respond to that resurgent neo-Nazi movement (other than by punching Nazis, whichI’m fine with but isn’t sufficient by itself as a collective response)? It willcome as something less than a surprise to know that a main answer of mine isthat we need to better engage with our histories, including those about whichI’ve written in this week’s series. But we really do, for lots of reasons butespecially this one: despite our understandable desire to define it assomething entirely outside of and opposed to our national identity, Nazism isindeed as American as, well, the Ford Mustang. Or,y’know, the moon landing. But sotoo is fighting Nazis, not just on the battlefields of Europe but incommunities and conversations here at home. Which is to say, the originalAntifa wasn’t just all those WWIIsoldiers—it was also, and I would argue especially, someone like IsadoreGreenbaum. As always, learning the horrific histories of American Nazismalso means learning the inspiring histories of figures like Greenbaum (and the100K New York protesters with whom he shared that 1939 activism). There are nomore important lessons than those for our renewed fight here in 2020.

Specialpost this weekend,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Other histories or stories you’d highlight?

June 19, 2025: American Nazis: Wernher von Braun

[In the summerof 1945, Nazi scientists began arriving in the United States, recruited towork in the US government and eventuallyits space program as part of OperationPaperclip. But they weren’t the first American Nazis by any means, and thisweek I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of others, leading up to a weekend post on aninteresting and fraught recent cultural representation of Paperclip.]

On threestriking lines from TomLehrer’s satirical song about the Nazi-turned-Americanscientist.

1)     “Call him a Nazi, he won’t even frown/‘Ha,Nazi, Schmazi,’ says Wernher von Braun”: As I’ll discuss at greater length inthe weekend post, what was perhaps most striking about Operation Paperclipwasn’t that it brought Nazi scientists to America, but that it did so soquickly and openly. Von Braun, the scientist single-handedly responsible forthe V2 rocket thatkilled a great many Londoners in the final year of the Blitz (among other workhe did for Hitler’s Nazi regime), was among those initial arrivals in theUnited States in late September 1945, less than 5 months after V-E Day. He wouldgo on to be a prominent public spokesperson as wellas scientist for NASA and the Space Program, appearing for example on three Walt Disney Man in Space TV shows. Clearly von Braun was able to immediatelyand consistently laugh away his service to Nazi Germany, and so, it seems wasthe US government.

2)     “Like the widows and cripples in old Londontown/Who owe their large pension to Wernher von Braun”: But not all Americanswere as willing or able to laugh that history away, as Lehrer’s early 1960ssong illustrates. There’s no shortage of contenders for the song’s most bitingcouplet, but I would have to go with this one, especially as it follows “Butsome think our attitude/Should be one of gratitude.” Obviously those who havebeen permanently and fatally affected by von Braun’s rockets would show him nogratitude—and Lehrer here links “us” and “our attitude” to those Londoncasualties. The first line in this verse, “Some have harsh words for this manof renown,” really drives home the point—after all, in 1945 what von Braun wasrenowned for was designing killing machines, and it was then that the USdecided to not just spare him from post-war trials and punishments, but tobring him to America and make him an integral, acclaimed part of our own ColdWar efforts.

3)     “Good old Americans like Dr. Wernher vonBraun!”: All of this adds a great deal more to Lehrer’s spoken introduction tothe song, which asks “what is it” that helped America advanced in both thenuclear and space races. “Well,” Lehrer replies, “it was good old American knowhow, that’s what, as provided by good old Americans like” von Braun. While ofcourse immigrants to the US are indeed American, von Braun’s immigration tookplace, again, just a few months after he was employed by and making weapons forthe US’s wartime adversary. Yet while on that level Lehrer’s description of himas a “good old American” could be read as ridiculous, I would say that the truesatire lies deeper—that our willingness to abandon morality or ethics inpursuit of scientific and Cold War “victories” was and is, indeed, all toodefining and foundational of an American trait.

LastNaziStudying tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Other histories or stories you’d highlight?

June 18, 2025: American Nazis: The Plot Against America

[In the summerof 1945, Nazi scientists began arriving in the United States, recruited towork in the US government and eventuallyits space program as part of OperationPaperclip. But they weren’t the first American Nazis by any means, and thisweek I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of others, leading up to a weekend post on aninteresting and fraught recent cultural representation of Paperclip.]

[NB. As ofmy drafting of this post, I haven’t had a chance to watch David Simon and Ed Burns’ HBOminiseries adaptation of Roth’s novel, so my thoughts here will focus on thebook. I hope to get to that at some point and will add an update here if and whenI do!]

On threetelling & compelling layers to PhilipRoth’s 2004 alternate historical fiction.

One of theconsistent pleasures of reading alternatehistories (as with historical fiction in general, of course) is seeing howthey incorporate actual historical figures into (and refigure them within) theirimagined histories. Roth’s novel includes dozens of such figures in both importantand minor roles, but three of the most central are ones I’ve featured orreferenced in prior posts this week: in Roth’s central premise, CharlesLindbergh is elected president in 1940 and aligns the US with Nazi Germany; heappoints Henry Ford as his Secretary of the Interior; and one of Lindbergh’smost consistent adversaries in the novel is New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia(who in real life pushed back on the 1939 Madison Square Garden Nazi rally,among many other anti-Naziand pro-Jewish efforts during his tenure as mayor). These historicalfigures make Roth’s novel a juicier read for any student of American history,but they also reflect a profound understanding of how the actual course of1930s and 40s American history already intersected with Nazi Germany in manydifferent ways. That is, this may be an alternate history, but it’s a potentlyrealistic one.

Roth’snovel does also include Father Coughlin, but in a briefer and more minor role,perhaps because one of Roth’s central fictional characters is a religiousleader in his own right: Newark’s Conservative Rabbi Lionel Bengelsdorf, whobecomes a prominent Lindbergh supporter and who later marries the narratorPhilip’s Aunt Evelyn. As far as I’ve been able to learn, no prominent JewishAmerican figures or leaders supported movements like the German American Bundor the America First Committee (which I wrote about in Monday and Tuesday’sposts, respectively), which makes sense given their overt and definingantisemitism. But it’s also the case that no one linked to those movements ranfor president, nor gained the widespread popular support of a frontrunner forthat highest office; both of which are true of Roth’s Lindbergh by the timethat Bengelsdorf endorses him. So it certainly seems plausible that aconservative Jewish figure like Bengelsdorf would under those circumstanceshitch his wagon to Lindbergh’s star—but it is even more plausible that doing sodoes not spare Bengelsdorf from the rising tide of Nazism and antisemitism, ashe is later arrested when widespread white supremacist riots target JewishAmericans throughout the nation.

To my mindthe novel’s most compelling characters are its younger generation JewishAmericans, however, a group that includes not only the narrator Philip, butalso and most complicatedly his older brother Sandy (among others). Sandy isselected by the Office of American Absorption (OAA) for its “Just Folks”program, which places Jewish boys with Southern and Midwestern families inorder to “Americanize” them; Sandy is sent to a farm in Kentucky and returnshome highly critical of his family (calling them “ghetto Jews”). This complexand fraught plotline echoes the experiences of young NativeAmericans sent to the late 19th and early 20thcentury boardingschools, as well as the broader “Americanization”movement of that same period. But it also allows Roth to explore anuncomfortable truth likewise revealed by the Washington’s birthday 1939 NewYork rally—that American Nazis could, and did, make the case that their beliefsand movement aligned with foundational elements of American identity. One morehistorical echo of this profoundly, painfully historical (and, yes, frustratinglysalient) alternate history novel.

NextNaziStudying tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Other histories or stories you’d highlight?

June 17, 2025: American Nazis: Ford, Lindbergh, and Coughlin

[In the summerof 1945, Nazi scientists began arriving in the United States, recruited towork in the US government and eventuallyits space program as part of OperationPaperclip. But they weren’t the first nor the only American Nazis by anymeans, and this week I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of others, leading up to a weekendpost on an interesting and fraught recent cultural representation of Paperclip.]

On threefamous figures who reflect the breadth and depth of American support for Nazis.

1)     Henry Ford: The automobile inventor andentrepreneur wasn’t just an American Nazi supporter—he was apparently aninfluence on Adolf Hitler himself. Between 1920 and 1927, Ford and his aideErnest G. Liebold published The Dearborn Independent, anewspaper that they used principally to expound antisemitic views and conspiracy theories; many ofFord’s writings in that paper were published in Germany as a four-volumecollection entitled The International Jew, the World’s ForemostProblem (1920-1922). Heinrich Himmler wrote in 1924 that Ford was “one ofour most valuable, important, and witty fighters,” and Hitlerwent further: in Mein Kampf (1925)he called Ford “a single great man” who “maintains full independence” fromAmerica’s Jewish “masters”; and in a 1931 DetroitNews interview, Hitler called Ford an “inspiration.” In 1938, Ford received the GrandCross of the German Eagle, one of Nazi Germany’s highest civilian honors.

2)     Charles Lindbergh: As I mentioned in this poston Lindbergh, the aviation pioneer likewise received a Cross of the GermanEagle in 1938, this one from Germanair chief Hermann Goering himself. Over the next two years, Lindbergh’spublic opposition to American conflict with Nazi Germany deepened, and despitesubsequent attempts to recuperate that opposition as fear over Soviet Russia’sinfluence, Lindbergh’s views depended entirely on antisemitic conspiracytheories that equaled Ford’s. In a September 1939 nationwide radioaddress, for example, Lindbergh argued, “We must ask who owns andinfluences the newspaper, the news picture, and the radio station, ... If ourpeople know the truth, our country is not likely to enter the war.” Seen inthis light, Lindbergh’srole as spokesman for the America FirstCommittee makes clear that that organization’s non-interventionistphilosophies could not and cannot be separated from the antisemitism and Nazisympathies of Lindbergh, Ford, and all those who took part in the 1939 MadisonSquare Garden rally.

3)     Father Coughlin: As the tens of thousands ofattendees at that rally illustrate, American Nazism was much more than just aperspective held by elite anti-Semites—it was very much a movement. And like somany problematic social movements, it featured a demagogic voice to help spreadits alternative realities—in this case, the Catholic priest turned radio host CharlesEdward Coughlin. Like any media figure who worked for many years, Coughlin saiddifferent things at different times; after the 1939 rally, for example, hesought to distance himself, arguing in his weekly address, “Nothing can begained by linking ourselves with any organization which is engaged in agitatingracial animosities or propagating racial hatreds.” But by that time, Coughlinhad been publicly supporting both NaziGermany and antisemitic conspiracy theories for years; his weeklymagazine, Social Justice, ran formuch of 1938 excerpts from the deeply antisemitic Protocols of the Elders of Zion (as that link illustrates, a text thatcontributed directly to the Holocaust). Both Social Justice and Coughlin’s radio show were hugely popular,illustrating that American Nazism and antisemitism were in the 1930s (as theyfrustratingly seem to be today) widespread views.

NextNaziStudying tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Other histories or stories you’d highlight?

June 16, 2025: American Nazis: Madison Square Garden

[In the summerof 1945, Nazi scientists began arriving in the United States, recruited towork in the US government and eventuallyits space program as part of OperationPaperclip. But they weren’t the first nor the only American Nazis by anymeans, and this week I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of others, leading up to a weekendpost on an interesting and fraught recent cultural representation of Paperclip.]

On threetelling sides to a February1939 Nazi rally in New York City.

1)     Organizers: Thanks to prominent individual figureslike the three on whom I’ll focus tomorrow (Henry Ford, Charles Lindbergh, andFather Coughlin), I think Americans have a general sense that there was supportfor Nazis in 1930s America. But that support was also organized, and oneof the chief such national organizations, the German AmericanBund, was the force behind the Madison Square Garden rally. While theBund was paralleled by other pro-Hitler organizations in the period like the Free Societyof Teutonia and the Friends ofthe New Germany, it seems to me that the Bund were also singular in their desireto wed these pro-Nazi Germany sentiments with direct appeals to mythic imagesof American identity and patriotism (on which more in item 2). And the rally’stwo keynote speakers reflect the Bund’s own multi-national, immigrant origins(not unlike America’s, if far more fully European): Bund leader Fritz Julius Kuhn was aGerman immigrant who had become a naturalized American citizen in 1934; whileBund secretary and Kuhn’s right-hand man James Wheeler-Hill was aRussian (Latvian) national and recent immigrant known as “the boy orator of theBund.”

2)     George Washington: The rally’s February 20thdate was chosen very specifically—it was George Washington’s birthday, and the stage featured aportrait of Washington flanked by both American flags and Nazi flags/swastikas.After the rally opened with a performance of “The Star-Spangled Banner,”Wheeler-Hill’s introductoryspeech proclaimed that “If George Washington were alive today, he wouldbe friends with Adolf Hitler.” In my book Of Thee I Sing: The Contested History ofAmerican Patriotism, I argue that celebratory patriotism (likethe communal ritual of standing for and singing the anthem) has throughoutAmerican history too often turned into mythic patriotism, the creation of mythsabout our history and identity that are generally used to exclude particulargroups from the America being embraced (and to define those groups as un- andeven anti-American). So it’s no coincidence that in Kuhn’s concluding speech,he argued that “The Bund is open to you, provided you are sincere, of goodcharacter, of white gentile stock, and an American citizen imbued withpatriotic zeal.”

3)     Protesters: That speech of Kuhn’s did not gooff smoothly, however—it was interrupted when IsadoreGreenbaum, a 26-year-old Jewish American US Navy veteran from Brooklyn,charged the stage; Greenbaum was attacked by Nazi guards, pulled away bypolice, and charged with disorderly conduct (for which he paid a $25 fine toavoid a 10-day jail sentence). He wasn’t the least bit apologetic, later stating, “Gee,what would you have done if you were in my place listening to that s.o.b.hollering against the government and publicly kissing Hitler's behind whilethousands cheered? Well, I did it.” Nor was he alone, as an estimated 100,000anti-Nazi protesters gathered outsidethe Garden, dwarfing the 20,000 or so Nazi sympathizers inside. Theprotesters featured World War I veterans, members of the Socialist WorkersParty, and countless other organizations and communities. This inspiring groupin no way mitigates the troubling realities of the rally and its reflection ofwidespread American support for Hitler and the Nazis; but it does remind usthat 1930s American patriotism, like every other element of our society and history,was deeply contested.

NextNaziStudying tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Other histories or stories you’d highlight?

June 14-15, 2025: Revolutionary War Figures: The Continental Army

[On June 14th,1775, the Continental Army was formed at the SecondContinental Congress in Philadelphia. So for the 250thof that momentous military moment, I’ve AmericanStudied a handful of iconicRevolutionary War figures, leading up to this special weekend post on thathistoric anniversary!]

Threetelling details about the formation and evolution of the Continental Army.

1)     New England Origins: Having grown up inVirginia and now spent more than half of my life in Massachusetts, I’m well awareof the longstanding debates over where the Revolution & thus the UnitedStates really began (and of course my other brief hometown, Philadelphia, canstake its own claim in that argument). I’m not necessarily trying to weigh inon that question in an overarching way here, but it is important to note thatthe first colonial armies were mustered in New England states—first Massachusetts in April 1775 (notlong after Lexington & Concord), and then NewHampshire, RhodeIsland, and Connecticutsoon after. Those armies seemingly convinced the Second Continental Congress ofthe need for a more truly nationwide force, and on June 14th theyvoted to establish the Continental Army (and a daylater elected Virginian George Washington as its commander; sorry NewEngland).

2)     Invading Canada: In March, the historian StacySchiff wrote an excellentop-ed for the New York Times (that’s a gift link if you don’tsubscribe) tracing the long and mostly very silly history of American leaderstoying with the idea of invading and/or annexing Canada. Obviously that goalwas at least significantly different during the Revolutionary War, and so itisn’t particularly surprising that the first major use of the Continental Army—almostimmediately after its creation, in fact—was to send Philip Schuyler’sNew York regiments to invadeour neighbor to the North. But I nonetheless agree with the headline atthat last hyperlinked article—that this was a hasty and ill-advised invasion,one almost certainly doomed to fail (and failit did). Perhaps the best way to put it is this: while the Continental Armywas initially created as a defense force (and mostly used as such throughoutthe war), once an army exists, it seems very difficult for its commanders notto want to use it for attacks as well.

3)     A Wartime or Standing Army?: An awareness ofthat fact was no doubt one significant factor in the widespreadAmerican opposition, both at the time of its creation, throughout theRevolution, and most especially into itsaftermath, to the Continental Army remaining in place as a standing army(rather than being defined as a wartime one that would be dissolved once saidwar was completed). It’s quite difficult, 75 years into the full explosion ofour military-industrialcomplex, to contemplate a United States without standing armed forces (andof course the relative absence of them didn’t end up being a great thing inthe Early Republic). But as with any aspect of our founding, I think weshould treat this concept as one that can and should still be debated—andbetter remembering the framing debates over the Continental Army can help us doso.

Nextseries starts Monday,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Rev War figures you’d highlight?

June 13, 2025: Revolutionary War Figures: YA Novels

[On June 14th,1775, the Continental Army was formed at the SecondContinental Congress in Philadelphia. So for the 250thof that momentous military moment, I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of iconicRevolutionary War figures, leading up to a special weekend post on thathistoric anniversary!]

On threegroundbreaking historical novels that reflect the evolution of young adultliterature.

1)     JohnnyTremain (1943): Esther Forbes’ Newbery Medal-winning novelfollows its title character from his life in 1773 as a 14 year oldsilversmith’s apprentice (a career cut short when he suffers a debilitatinghand injury early in the novel) through his gradual connection to the Sons ofLiberty and participation in the Boston Tea Party (among other events),building to a climax set against the April 1775 battles of Lexington andConcord. Although Forbes creates Johnny’s 1770s Boston with depth and nuance,there’s never any doubt that the Sons are on the right side of history, athread that likewise climaxes in the novel’s concluding section with a movingspeech from James Otis(whom the other Sons had often dismissed as an insane old man) about theRevolutionary sacrifices that will be necessary and appropriate so “that a mancan stand up.” Johnny Tremain is,let’s say, a Revolutionary historical novel for the Greatest Generation era.

2)     MyBrother Sam is Dead (1974): James Lincoln Collier and ChristopherCollier’s NewberyHonor-winning (and National BookAward nominated!) novel offers a far more murky and (often) dark vision ofthe Revolution. The narrator, Tim Meeker, is torn between his loyalist fatherand Continental Army soldier brother in the early years of the Revolution;while we might expect transformations or reunions from a young adult novel,instead Tim’s father is abducted by pirates and dies of cholera on a prisonship, one of Tim’s friends is decapitated by the British, and Sam is eventuallyexecuted by the Continental Army (for stealing cattle, a crime for which he hadbeen framed). This is a world where not only are loyalties divided and choicesuncertain, but death and brutality seem to await regardless of what choices onemakes; when Tim reveals in the conclusion that he has been writing the bookfrom 1826, his survival seems to be the novel’s version of a happy ending. My Brother Sam is Dead is, let’s say, aRevolutionary historical novel for the Vietnam War and Watergate era.

3)     TheAstonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume I: The PoxParty (2006): M.T. Anderson’s NationalBook Award-winning novel, the first in a two-volume series (the second, TheKingdom on the Waves, was published in 2009), is the story of auniquely talented African American slave in Revolutionary Boston who findshimself and his mother used (and she killed) for social and medical experimentson race, escapes slavery and joins the Continental Army, and eventually (in thecourse of the series) joins the British forces in Virginia instead due to hisopposition to American slavery. The novels wed Gothic tropes (Octavian’s Bostonhome is very much a Gothic haunted house, for example) to revisionist histories(his Massachusetts slaveowners are in league with Virginia planters to pursuetheir racist agenda, complicating our narratives of both American slavery andthe Revolution), with the result a historical fantasy that imagines a fardifferent nation and world than either of the prior novels had. The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothingis, let’s say, a Revolutionary historical novel for the multicultural and Obamaera.

Specialpost this weekend,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Rev War figures you’d highlight?

June 12, 2025: Revolutionary War Figures: Benedict Arnold

[On June 14th,1775, the Continental Army was formed at the SecondContinental Congress in Philadelphia. So for the 250thof that momentous military moment, I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of iconicRevolutionary War figures, leading up to a special weekend post on thathistoric anniversary!]

On the benefits and the limitations to remembering our mostinfamous traitor the way we do.

I’m not going to argue that we shouldn’t remember BenedictArnold as one of our first, and one of our most enduring, national traitors,because, well, he was. Compared to the contestedand still controversial treason accusations leveled at his contemporary AaronBurr, Arnold’s traitorous acts were far more overt and undisputed—when Major Andre was caught andArnold’s plan to hand over the fort at West Point to British forces discovered,Arnold immediately went over to the British side and helped lead their wareffort for the war’s remaining two years; after the Revolution he settled inEngland and lived out his remaining two decades of life in that adoptedhomeland.

So Arnold was a traitor to the Revolutionary army and cause,and remembering him as such is certainly accurate to the specific histories andevents. Doing so is also beneficial on a broader level, as it forces us to recognizethe Founding Fathers and their iconic Revolutionary peers as no less human andflawed than any other leaders or people. Arnold was one of the Revolution’sfirst war heroes, playing a decisive role in the early victory atSaratoga and other conflicts; yet just two short years later, politics andpreferences within the Continental Army, coupled with financial difficulties (perhapsdue to lending money to the Continental Army, which would be a textbookdefinition of irony), led Arnold to cast his lot with the same forces he hadhelped defeat at Saratoga. 

Yet there’s at least one significant downside to rememberingArnold as a traitor, or more exactly to the collective blind spot that suchmemories reveal. After all, the most simple yet most commonly ignored fact ofthe Revolution is this: it represented an act of treason against the colonists’Royal government, and each and every American involved in it was thus atraitor. (There was a reason why BenFranklin worried, at the signing of the Declaration of Independence, abouteveryone hanging separately if they did not hang together.) Awareness of thatfact might not change our collective perspective on the Revolution and itsleaders—but might it not at least shift our understanding of the loyalists, of those whosided (lawfully) withEngland during the war? As a soldier who sold out his comrades, Arnold wasof course something more than just a loyalist—but the point here is thattreason, during the Revolution, was a loaded and complex concept however welook at it.

LastRevolutionary figure tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Rev War figures you’d highlight?

June 11, 2025: Revolutionary War Figures: The “Black Regiment”

[On June 14th,1775, the Continental Army was formed at the SecondContinental Congress in Philadelphia. So for the 250thof that momentous military moment, I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of iconicRevolutionary War figures, leading up to a special weekend post on thathistoric anniversary!]

Threetelling details about the Continental Army’s longstanding, largely AfricanAmerican 1stRhode Island Regiment.

1)     Fraught Origins: If the existence of a 1770sarmy regiment dominated numerically by African American soldiers is no doubtsurprising, one of the main origin points for this unit will likely be less so:throughout the first few years of the war, a number of slaveowners chose to send theirslaves to fight rather than join the Continental Army themselves (with theslaveowners still receiving a good bit of the soldiers’ pay, natch). When theArmy, desperate for more troops, changedthe rules in February 1778 to allow Black soldiers to volunteer theirown service, Rhode Island (still a slave state, as they all were in 1778) tookthings one step further: the state’s GeneralAssembly voted to allow the enlistment of “every able-bodied negro, mulatto, orIndian man slave,” promising that every one who so enlisted would “beimmediately discharged from the service of his master or mistress, and beabsolutely free.” The worst and best of America, right there in one moment andmilitary unit.   

2)     Two Brave Battles: Not too long after thatshift, the 1st Rhode Island saw its first significant combat, in theAugust 1778 Battleof Rhode Island (mostly fought near the island city of Newport). The 1stwere tasked with defending an important position that was under sustainedassault by the British, and specifically by very dangerous Hessian mercenaries;the 1stfought off three distinct attacks, helping win a pitched battle that the Marquis deLafayette would call “the best fought action of the war.” It was the firstof many battles the 1st would take part in, but here I’ll highlight onemore, a far more tragic and equally inspiring conflict: the May 1781 Battleof Pine’s Bridge (New York), when a small band of the 1st wereambushed by a far larger contingent of British troops. The regiment’s ColonelGreene and eight Black soldiers were killed, and itwas reported that the soldiers “defended their beloved Col. Greene so wellthat it was only over their dead bodies that the enemy reached and murdered him.”

3)     A Culminating Presence: The 1stRhode Island was one of the only Continental Army units to serve until the endof the Revolution, only disbanding when the entire army was disbanded in November1783. That meant for example that the regiment was part of the Revolution’sfinal significant battle, playing an important role in the October 1781 Siegeof Yorktown. And while there was not much major combat over the two yearsafter that point, the regiment continued to serve an important role, guardingthe city of Newburgh, New York from potential British invasion and even takingpart in a planned but ultimately aborted expeditionto capture the British Fort Ontario in Oswego. From its origins to itsmultiple endpoints, you can’t tell the story of the Continental Army nor of theAmerican Revolution without a prominent place for the 1st RhodeIsland Regiment.

NextRevolutionary figure tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Rev War figures you’d highlight?

June 10, 2025: Revolutionary War Figures: Molly Pitcher

[On June14th, 1775, the Continental Army was formed at the SecondContinental Congress in Philadelphia. So for the 250th of that momentousmilitary moment, I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of iconic Revolutionary Warfigures, leading up to a special weekend post on that historic anniversary!]

On the iconicwar hero who might or might not have existed, and why she matters in any case.

I can think offew more AmericanStudies ways to analyze popular memory and prominence thanthrough thetwelve rest stops on the New Jersey turnpike—and by that measure, MollyPitcher and ClaraBarton are the two most famous women in New Jersey history and culture (ifthat last phrase isn’t an oxymoron—I kid, Jerseyites, I kid). Pitcher’s is alsothe only one of the twelve rest stop referents that wasn’t an actual name, andthat might not even link to an individual figure—some historians believe thatthe name does refer to one woman, Mary Ludwig Hays,who followed her husband and the Continental Army to the Battleof Monmouth and found herself not only serving water to the soldiers buteven takingover her wounded husband’s artillery job; but others have linked the nameto a number of other Revolutionary-era women who performed one or another ofthose roles (camp followers, water carriers, and so on), includingMargaret Corbin.

So Molly Pitcheris as much a folkloric as a historical figure, one not unlike Paul Bunyan, JohnHenry, or, perhaps more accurately, Central Massachusetts’s own local legend JohnnyAppleseed. Because like Appleseed’s inspiration John Chapman (about whomsee that hyperlinked, wonderful Guest Post by William Kerrigan), women likeHays and Corbin most definitely existed; the details of their lives andexperiences are as partial and uncertain as most any 18th centuryhistories, even those of theRevolution’s most prominent leaders, but there’s plenty of information outthere, such as at the various stories linked in my first paragraph’s closingsentences, and the Molly Pitcher legend provides an excellent starting pointfor researching and learning about these historical figures. Even absent suchresearch, any collective memory of “Molly Pitcher” itself adds women to ournarratives of these Revolutionary war battles and histories, producing a morefull and accurate picture of those histories as a result.

I’d take thatargument one step further, however. I’ve written on multiple occasions,including in this poston Judith Sargent Murray and this oneon John and Abigail Adams, about the striking cultural, social, andpolitical voices and roles of Revolutionary-eraAmerican women (including not only Murray and Adams but also PhillisWheatley, AnnisBoudinot Stockton, and others). Indeed, it’s fair to say that such womenhelp us to see the era’s possibilities for gender and society as likewiserevolutionary, and as foreshadowing and influencing the19th century women’s movement. That some of these women,including Adams and Stockton, achieved such success in relationship to theirhusbands’ lives and work—just as, that is, Hays and Corbin did in relationshipto their husband’s wartime efforts—reflects some of the era’s limitations andobstacles; limitations and obstacles that all these women, like Molly Pitcher,pushed well beyond.

Next Revolutionaryfigure tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Rev War figures you’d highlight?