#i got the american revolution

[iliveinyourceiling65]

shoutout to Hamilton for helping me get straight As in History three years in a row

[papers-pamphlet]

Week 9

Below crop is some really indecent handholding !!!

[tallmadgeandtea]

Turn Week 2023:

History Nerdery!

Hello, and Happy Fourth of July! For today's Turn Week, I wanted to talk about Benjamin's regiment in the Continental Army. We all know he's a Connecticut Dragoon, but what does that mean and what did they do, exactly? I'm going to let you know! The Continental Cavalry is my favorite unit in the army, and I actually did an Honors Research Project on them last year for my college. WARNING: this is going to be LONG. I'm sorry. Kind of.

What is the Continental Cavalry?

The cavalry is the mounted troops in a military force, meaning they fight on horseback. At the time of the Revolution, the cavalry was considered an elite and necessary force for a proper military. Combat on horseback was dangerous- you not only had to avoid cannon and gunfire, but you had to attack other mounted troops with lances and sabers of their own.

There are two types of cavalry: light cavalry and heavy cavalry. The light cavalry had three primary duties. Scouting, which was to patrol enemy forces, movements, and the terrain surrounding camps and battlefields, which also played into reconnaissance. They also served as messengers to officers on and off the battlefield. On the other hand, heavy cavalry was troops used in action. Their objective was to lead charges and weaken the enemy’s unmounted troops, like going after their flanks. They also performed raids/ambushes or small skirmishes against the enemy. Their combat was on and off the battlefield.

Due to the near constant lack of funds for the Continentals, their Dragoons performed both light and heavy cavalry roles. A dragoon/trooper is a soldier who fights either on horseback or on foot, depending on the amount of horse available. They used weapons such as: a cavalry saber, a shortgun, and a musket.

Unlike the British army, which brought over cavalry forces, at the beginning of the war, there was not an official cavalry for the Continentals. Some state and organized militias had mounted troops- such as the Philadelphia Light Horse- but professional, commissioned troops had not seen action.

After seeing the performance of the British cavalry during the New York Campaign, General George Washington realized his army needed horses of their own. Writing to Congress in late 1776, “From the Experience I have had in this Campaign… I am Convinced there is no carrying on the War without them.”

What made up the Continental Cavalry?

In 1777, the cavalry's first year in action, there were four regiments of Light Dragoons.

The 1st Regiment of Dragoons- from Virginia, also known as Bland's Light Horse. Their uniforms were originally the "classic" Continental coat: blue with red facings, but they then changed the standard to brown with green facings.

The 2nd Regiment, also known as the Connecticut Light Dragoons, Colonel Elisha Sheldon and Benjamin Tallmadge's force, mustered from Connecticut, hence the name. Their uniform was blue with buff facings.

The 3rd Regiment, aka Colonel Baylor's or Lady Washington's Light Horse, in honor of Martha Washington. Their uniform was white with blue facings (one of my favorite uniforms in the army.)

And the 4th Regiment, led by Colonel Stephen Moylan. His troops originally wore red! coats, and this lead to some incidents of friendly fire. At Washington's order, the regiment changed to green with red facings.

How does this relate to Turn: Benjamin Tallmadge and His Dragoons.

Although the show does not get into heavy detail about Benjamin Tallmadge's battle experience, we know what battles he was present at with his regiment.

1777 the cavalry's first years as professional troops in battle. Both had very... different outcomes, let's say. Both were also mentioned or briefly shown in season 2 of Turn, and my research focused on this.

During the Campaigns, a set of troops from each regiment of Dragoons was stationed with General Washington in Pennsylvania, led by Bland, Moylan, Baylor, Sheldon, and Tallmadge.

Benjamin Tallmadge and his soldiers were present at both the Battles of Brandywine and Germantown.

At Brandywine, Washington first used the dragoons for only scouting, not combat. But as the British went after his insecure right flank, he frantically sent units of soldiers and cavalry to prevent the British from getting to the road along and to Brandywine Creek. The cavalry also acted as messengers to officers during this battle, but insufficient preparation and speed led to delayed reports. The cavalry did lead a charge that allowed Washington to retreat, but the day was lost. Afterwards, the British marched into the Continental capital of Philadelphia.

After Brandywine, Washington needed another battle to try and take back Philadelphia. With a night march, he decided to attack the British near their camp in Germantown, Pennsylvania, a small village outside the city.

Washington had four columns, 2 made up of Continental forces and two of state militias. Just as at Brandywine, his right wing was commanded by Sullivan, and his left by Greene. The Dragoons were now under their newly commissioned commander, General Pulaski. Tallmadge stated in his memoirs that, “if every division of the army had performed its allotted part, it seems as if we must have succeeded.”

Unfortunately, this would not be the outcome at Germantown. At the beginning of the battle, the Continentals were winning. Part of the camp was captured. A heavy fog and rain set over the battlefield, and the British used this fog to their advantage. They retreated into a local country house and created a stalemate.

Benjamin Tallmadge and his dragoons were first stationed with Sullivan’s division, close upon “the scene of the action.” As the battle turned against the Continental forces and the troops became victim to enemy and friendly fire, Washington ordered him to use his 2nd Dragoons to block any further retreat, to no avail. Germantown was lost.

Germantown was the last official engagement of the Philadelphia campaign. But on June 28, 1778, the Continental Army and the Cavalry engaged the forces at the Battle of Monmouth in New Jersey. Due to proper military training thanks to the Inspector General Baron von Steuben and six months of waiting at Valley Forge, the army emerged as a proper fighting force and prevailed against the British. The victory allowed the Continentals to take back their capital and keep Washington in as Commander in Chief.

Monmouth is the shown in the finale of season 2- Gunpowder, Treason, and Plot- with Benjamin leading his dragoons into the battle.

After the 1777 campaigns, Tallmadge and his dragoons would stay up north, particularly New York, to patrol and engage the enemy in raids. They also participated in the Battles of Stony Point and Fort St. George, which were shown in seasons 3 and 4 of Turn.

Sources (and further reading):

Memoir of Col. Benjamin Tallmadge : Tallmadge, Benjamin, 1754-1835 : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Brandywine: A Military History of the Battle that Lost Philadelphia but Saved America, September 11, 1777 by Michael C. Harris, Paperback | Barnes & Noble® (barnesandnoble.com)

Germantown: A Military History of the Battle for Philadelphia, October 4, 1777 by Michael C. Harris, Hardcover | Barnes & Noble® (barnesandnoble.com)

Cavalry of the American Revolution - Jim Piecuch - Westholme Publishing

[precious-little-scoundrel]

I pitched headlong back into my Lafayette feels tonight

[ms-march]

On my way home from my first day working at Colonial Williamsburg ???

[patronsaint-ofthedenial]

"green day hasn't been that good since american idiot" says random asshole who listens to every album since then with american idiot or dookie in mind

[applefruitluver69]

twinkified washy

[heir-less]

Remember this article? Flash forward a year or two and Kate is now the white woman telling a Black person to sit at the back of a church. She now has Jim Crow levels of racism according to the ROTA.

[gremlins-hotel]

So idk how much you keep actual history in mind for hetalia thoughts but I wanted to ask:

How old do u think Alfred was when he fought for independence- and won.

Me and my friends have always imagined him as around 16 or so maybe 18 tops

like how unsettling would it have been to hear about some 16 year old that defeated a world superpower

and then hearing much later that that same “kid” (adult now) has introduced nuclear warfare like..

I’m not saying that if I was a country i would be scared but like. Yes I would be scared.

in modern day i tend to make alfred around the age of 25.

as for the revolution? i would say a physical appearance between 16-18 is a good benchmark. personally, i would probably say 17 or 18. he needs to be at least a teen is all i know. i remember seeing some ideas float around that he was still very much a child, which makes no sense to me. but here's a little background logic for you:

at youngest, alfred should be ~168 years old (jamestown, may 1607) by the time the military war starts (april 1775). he could also be ~190 (roanoke, 1585) or even ~210 (st. augustine, september 1565). i highly doubt the latter, but i did once see a former fan consider this spanish colonization of florida as his birth...

so regardless of whichever way you cut him, i would argue he's going to be anywhere from 170-200 years old as an entity. so you can piecemeal that how you like in terms of physical age. the revolution itself was a long process and its seeds were in many places that weren't military. the military component wasn't even necessarily a goal; maybe to some it was, but to many it was not. a large proportion of the trouble was creating and identifying with the label of "american" rather than "british" or "british american". (as for unified identity, you could look at something such as the Join, or Die cartoon as a positive argument towards the start of an "american" identity.)

alfred should be around an age when he could be apprenticed or in an institution such as a college. this kid was reading, learning, and getting into law and philosophy. if there was something he was curious about, he was going to find out more, whether you wanted him to or not. and, furthermore, that kid was going to use that knowledge.

[publius-library]

Why do you think Hamilton supported the Alien and Seduction acts as an immigrant himself?

This is a common discussion I see, and it becomes quite easy to understand when you take into account the current events, what prompted the Alien and Sedition Acts (which is what I will assume you meant instead of Seduction, since I think it would be pretty self explanatory why Hamilton would support Seduction acts), who John Adams was, and Hamilton's beliefs.

Firstly, the most prominent international event occurring at the time was the French Revolution. When the Revolutionary government replaced that of the Ancien Regime, it dissolved it's alliances with foreign nations, especially after they cut their king's head off. This resulted in a war and a dude you might have heard of named Napoleon, but we don't need to get into that to understand that Britain and France had major beef, even more so than before. As a result, a lot of the French people who did not approve of their government's actions, but still did not want to live under a monarchy, immigrated to the United States. Much like today's current debate over immigration, some people believed that the United States were not obligated to give refuge to these immigrants, that they would take American jobs, and posed a risk to American citizens. Hence, the Alien portion of the Alien and Sedition Acts.

As for the Sedition part, this was a personal gift from John Adams to himself. He was a very egotistical, sensitive man who could not take criticism of his policies from the newspapers. As stated by the National Archives, "The Sedition Act made it a crime for American citizens to "print, utter, or publish...any false, scandalous, and malicious writing" about the government."

John Adams, a Federalist, believed that in putting restrictions on citizenship and free speech, he was preventing American people from sympathizing with the French in the potential war that was brewing between America and France, since France was currently raging and ruining everything and making everything difficult for everyone.

Now, where does Hamilton come in? Hamilton was a Federalist, and while he didn't agree with Adams on almost anything, he was fiercely against any kind of violent rebellion. This is exhibited in the many times he attempted to stop a mob, the earliest one being at King's College, when he stood before a mob and lectured them, buying time for the president of the college to escape being tarred and feathered. This is repeated during the Cadaver Riots in 1788. This belief of his can be traced back to his childhood in the Caribbean, in which there was a constant fear that the overwhelming enslaved population (80% of the island's inhabitants were enslaved Africans) would revolt.

Hamilton was also a fan of Thomas Hobbes, who believed in a cynical idea of human nature, in which every individual is self-serving to their own wants and needs. Hobbes wrote in The Leviathan, "And from hence it comes to pass that, where an invader hath no more to fear than another man's single power, if one plant, sow, build, or possess, a convenient seat others may probably be expected to come prepared with forces united to dispossess and deprive him not only of the fruit of his labor but also of his life or liberty." The key differences between the philosophies of Thomas Hobbes and John Locke also resemble the distinction between Federalists and Democratic Republicans.

All this to say, Hamilton's beliefs were shared with Adams- the French immigrants were possibly dangerous, being a threat to the stable revolution that was surviving in America. Additionally, he followed the principles of Hobbes in his belief that the government was responsible for keeping the people in check, and preventing them from entering into their natural state, which made life "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." The goal of the Alien and Sedition Acts was to prevent individuals aiming to bring a French-style rebellion to the United States, and to discourage similar sentiments from circulating in the press.

Clearly, this didn't work. The United States never went to war with France, this violation of the right to the press was not tolerated, Adams never served another term as president, and Hamilton never convinced a mob to disperse. The Alien and Sedition Acts weren't entirely anti-immigrant, as they were mainly targeted by the French, and if you're asking me personally, I believe Hamilton was able to disregard this as the law for citizenship (changing the residency requirements from 5 to 14 years) wouldn't apply to him anymore, and he could further hide the fact that he was an immigrant. He was ashamed of his origins, as the Caribbean was used at the time as, essentially, a large prison, and he didn't have the best reputation while he was there. I do think it is ironic that Adams was responsible for the Alien and Sedition Acts, and he was the one who tormented Hamilton for this birthplace. But, you know, I wasn't in that crazy ass redhead's mind.

I know this is long, but I've thought about this before, and I love getting into the reasoning behind Hamilton's politics. He was one of those cases where you can really see how his personal life influenced his political beliefs, and I think that's really interesting. Anyway, I hope this helps, and thank you for the ask <3

[keptflame]

.

[papers-pamphlet]

may I ask to see your amrev oc if you've drawn them yet

Sorry for the late answer ! I drew him now :3

Presenting Giles no-last-name-yet! Aka the "Nameless Colonel" (the name he had in my head)

Some lore --- A man in his early thirties. He studied seems religious (always carries around a bible and references it at any opportunity). He also seems to have an interest in ancient civilizations (specifically mesopotamia). (If the epic of Gilgamesh was discovered and deciphered back then he would have been OBSESSED with it)

Despite the religious tendencies, he has questionable morality. He is quite sadistic both in person and on the battlefield. It is questioned if he even has any loyalty for the king as sometimes (in you'll never be mine/dear redcoat verse he finds Laurens's relation with Hamilton "interesting")

he only really seeks to be entertained, really.

Also,, pstt,, @hamalicious-soup

[demonicseries]

Diversity loss! Your treasured mutual is British

[romanceyourdemons]

the founding of a republic (2009) is a fascinating film; there is much about it that can be said and much that does not need to be said. it does not need to be argued or even said that this film is not just patriotic but propagandistic, commissioned as it was to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the founding of the people’s republic of china and depicting an uplifting consensus narrative of the event. it also does not need to be said that the film’s unbelievably large cast and assumption of thorough audience familiarity with the events being depicted means that its in media res opening is difficult to get into the swing of. the two of these manifest features of the film both influence a more interesting element: that this film is willing to give up a tightly woven and easily empathized-with narrative in favor of a highly developed affect of historicity. unlike xie jin’s similarly patriotic the red detachment of women (1961) and unlike the hong kong historical drama the soong sisters (1997), which in some ways i consider a spiritual predecessor to this film, the founding of a republic (2009) does not follow the emotional arc of a small handful of fictional or fictionalized characters. instead, the plot anchors itself in highly public, clearly recorded moments of historical spectacle, events which can easily be checked for historical accuracy. this quasi-documentary affect of historicity is epitomized in several scenes in the film shown in sepia tones rather than color to mimic newsreel footage, and which are actually mixed with newsreel footage at the end of the film. these most realistic moments depict mass popular movement rather than the actions of a few party leaders; this artistic decision centralizes mass movements in the story of the founding of the republic and firmly moves the film’s climax away from one individual’s decision. the closest thing we get to that kind of climax is chiang kai-shek’s moment of redemption at the end of the film, not a move i expected a film like this to make. by and large, though, this film seeks to stir up popular sentiment by centralizing popular action, a decision which, though not as typical in and (in my opinion) not as effective as the small-cast pathos of precedent films, certainly aligns the founding of a republic (2009)’s form with its function and results in an undeniably effective film

[pub-lius]

my biggest problem with a people’s history of the french revolution by eric hazan is that he keeps like. implying that lafayette defected to the enemy (meaning Austria and Prussia), but like. mf was immediately arrested bc he was seen as the cause of the revolution. the only people who saw him as a conservative were in france

[bethisblogging]

There’s another post going around vaguely shaming historians for not saying historical people were gay when the signs are there so this is a reminder that

1) the idea of gay as we modernly conceptualize it was Not a thing, historically,

2) they may have been more than friends. They may have fucked. They may have been true life partners. Or they really were just dear friends. A lot of times it’s not very easy to have all the nuance AND come out and be like “yes they were queer.”

3) just because a historian can’t declare someone as gay doesn’t mean they aren’t part of queer history!

Also this is NOT a defense of historians who ignore when someone straight up came out. Like by the time you get to the earth 20th century the modern ideas of sexuality were pretty much established. There are people who were imprisoned then for being gay. They deserve to be fully recognized with their identities.