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The inventor, the ladies’ man, the affable diplomat, and the purveyor of pithy homespun wisdom: we all know the charming, resourceful Benjamin Franklin. What is less appreciated is the importance of Franklin’s part in the American Revolution: except for Washington he was its most irreplaceable leader. Although aged and in ill health, Franklin served the cause with unsurpassed zeal and dedication. Jonathan R. Dull, whose decades of work on The Papers of Benjamin Franklin have given him rare insight into his subject, explains Franklin’s role in the Revolution, what prepared him for that role, and what motivated him. The Franklin presented here, a man immersed in the violence, danger, and...
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In the four months following the January 20, 1783, armistice that ended the War for American Independence, Franklin was remarkably energetic as he helped oversee the transition to peace and waged a multifaceted campaign to publicize the ideals of the new nation. Though political turmoil in Britain delayed negotiations for the definitive peace treaty, Franklin deftly negotiated America's first commercial treaty with a neutral nation, Sweden, which was signed in secret. He distributed his richly symbolic Libertas Americana medal, worked toward the publication of his French edition of the American state constitutions, and fielded scores of letters from people all over Europe who sought to emigrate, to establish trade connections with the United States, to become consuls, and to offer congratulations and advice.
Since the early decades of the eighteenth century, European, and especially British, thinkers were preoccupied with questions of taste. Whether Americans believed that taste was innate—and therefore a marker of breeding and station—or acquired—and thus the product of application and study—all could appreciate that taste was grounded in, demonstrated through, and confirmed by reading, writing, and looking. It was widely believed that shared aesthetic sensibilities connected like-minded individuals and that shared affinities advanced the public good and held great promise for the American republic. Exploring the intersection of the early republic's material, visual, literary, and polit...
These volumes, published in conjunction with the Rhode Island Historical Society, represent the result of an exhaustive search for documents relating to the life and career of Revolutionary War general Nathanael Greene. The papers--letters and documents received by Greene as well as those sent by him--are carefully edited and fully annotated. The editors reproduce many items in full but abstract papers that are of lesser significance. Greene, who served as quartermaster general of the army and later as commander of the forces fighting in the southern theater, is generally considered the ablest of Washington's generals. His papers are a vital source of information on the war itself as well as on the man.
What connects political violence in Classical Athens and state terrorism in the Roman republic to the Easter Sunday attacks in Sri Lanka and the modern destruction of monuments? Using 9/11 as a lens through which to examine past instances of terrorism, this book presents a wide global view of the use of terror and its impact throughout history. Contributors are: Jaime A. González-Ocaña, Aaron L. Beek, Francesco Mori, Gaius Stern, Timothy Smith, João Nisa, Ölbei Tamás, James Crossland, Paul J. Cook, Chris Millington, Vineeth Mathoor, Dmitry Shlapentokh, Kalinga Tudor Silva, Cserkits Michael, Katty Cristina Lima Sá, Tatiana Konrad, Daniel Leach, Paul J. Cook, Mark Briskey, Silke Zoller, Elizabeth L. Miller, and William V. Hudon.
When the Revolutionary War began, the odds of a united, continental effort to resist the British seemed nearly impossible. Few on either side of the Atlantic expected thirteen colonies to stick together in a war against their cultural cousins. In this pathbreaking book, Robert Parkinson argues that to unify the patriot side, political and communications leaders linked British tyranny to colonial prejudices, stereotypes, and fears about insurrectionary slaves and violent Indians. Manipulating newspaper networks, Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Franklin, and their fellow agitators broadcast stories of British agents inciting African Americans and Indians to take up arms against the American rebe...
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Jean Ternant's life (1751-1833) spanned a period of enormous change in European life. Born when men were still subject to judicial torture, he lived to see the dawn of the railroad age. It was an era of political upheaval: the American Revolution, the "patriot" movement of the Dutch Republic, the Vonckist uprising in the Austrian Netherlands, the French Revolution, the Polish rebellion against Imperial Russia, the Greek war for independence and the struggle for independence in Spain's South American colonies all occurred during Ternant's lifetime. He was an active participant in four of them. The son of a French leather goods merchant, Jean Ternant nevertheless built a public service career in an aristocratic society based on birth and privilege, commanding a regiment in the French army before being appointed minister-plenipotentiary to the United States. His story of public service undertaken for private ends illustrates the value of education and social contacts as well as the importance of luck and circumstances.