1. The Divided Revolution

2. “The need for a unified story of the nation’s birth…has obscured the fact that Americans were deeply divided” during the Revolution.

3. The Myth of the Minutemen
The militias (the citizen-soldier)
Concord
Mid-Atlantic
Maryland
Who gets to decide?

4. Radical Pennsylvania
Voters: Taxpayers rather than landholders, “associators,” independence supporters
State Constitution: farmers, artisans, doctors, teachers, immigrants, militiamen
Merchants vs. workers
Continental dollar and inflation
“Down with your prices or down with yourselves.”
Taking it to the streets

5. Slavery One-fifth of Continental army was African American
Abolition in northern states
The Southern Campaign
Slavery and a southern civil war
Greatest slave rebellion in American history
Continued agitation after the war

6. Native Americans Iroquois divided Cherokee, Creek, Choctaw
Summer 1779, subduing the Iroquois was Washington’s primary mission.
Cherokee, Creek, Choctaw
Spanish entry into the war
Not invited to the peace talks

7. Women’s Protests
Centered on economically-based actions like boycotts
Politicizing women’s responsibilities
Homespun
Sewing and spinning circles

8. Women during the Revolution
Women and mob violence
Laws addressing boycotts and black markets specifically reference women
Camp followers
Sewed, cooked, cleaned, nursed, foraged for supplies
Female spies
Played up their “womanly weaknesses”
Elizabeth Burgin
Boarding houses and hospitals
Elizabeth Drinker
Development of a female patriotism
Centered on sacrifice and the politicization of women’s traditional roles

9. After the War
Women were not compensated for their wartime activities/sacrifices
Governments had no money
Not seen as the government’s responsibility
No push from women for rights: why?
Wartime freedom often not an empowering experience
Femme covert actually worsens

10. Republican Motherhood
Educational opportunities increase
Women are the mothers of future citizens
Women form associations
Charity and prayer based: widows and orphans
Associations gradually become more political