n today’s United States, the legacy of the American Revolution looms large. From presidential speeches to bestselling biographies, from conservative politics to school pageants, everybody knows something about the Revolution. Yet what was a messy, protracted, = divisive, and destructive war has calcified into a t the Iglorified founding moment of the American nation. h e g Disparate events with equally diverse participants Revolution have been reduced to a few key scenes and characters, RememberinMemory, History, and Nation Making from Independence to the Civil War presided over by well-meaning and wise old men. In this lively collection of essays, historians and literary scholars consider how the first three generations of American citizens interpreted their = nation’s origins. They show how the memory of the Revolution became politicized early in the nation’s EditEd by history, as different interests sought to harness its Michael A. McDonnell meaning for their own ends. No single faction succeeded, and at the outbreak of the Civil War the Clare Corbould American people remained divided over how to Frances M. Clarke remember the Revolution. and MIChAel A. MCDoNNell is associate professor W. Fitzhugh Brundage of history at the University of Sydney. ClARe CoRBoUlD is Australian Research Council Future Fellow at Monash University, Melbourne. FRANCeS M. ClARke is senior lecturer at the University of Sydney. W. FITzhUgh BRUNDAge is professor of history at the University of North Carolina, Chapel hill. a volume in the series Public history in historical Perspective Cover design by Sally Nichols Cover painting by emanuel leutze, Washington Crossing the Delaware, oil on canvas, 1851, 149 x 255 in. (378.5 x 647.7 cm), Metropolitan Museum of Art. gift of John Stewart kennedy, 1897. Acc. no. 97.34. UNIveRSITY oF MASSAChUSeTTS PReSS Amherst and Boston www.umass.edu/umpress MASSACHUSETTS MCDONNELL_COVER_revised.indd 1 9/4/13 12:53 PM “This page intentionally left blank” RememberinThE g R nEvoluTio = a volume in the series Public History in Historical Perspective Edited by Marla R. Miller Memory, History, and Nation Making RememberinThE Memory, History, and Nationg Making from Independence to the Civil War R nEvoluTio from Independence to the Civil War = EDITED BY Michael A. McDonnell Clare Corbould Frances M. Clarke and W. Fitzhugh Brundage University of Massachusetts Press Amherst and Boston Copyright © 2013 by University of Massachusetts Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America ISBN 978-1-62534-033-7 (paper) 032-0 (cloth) Designed by Sally Nichols Set in Bauer Bodoni and Filosofia Printed and bound by IBT/Hamilton, Inc. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Remembering the Revolution : memory, history, and nation making from independence to the Civil War / edited by Michael A. McDonnell, Clare Corbould, Frances M. Clarke, and W. Fitzhugh Brundage. pages cm. — (Public history in historical perspective) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-62534-033-7 (pbk. : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-62534-032-0 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. United States—History—Revolution, 1775–1783—Influence. I. McDonnell, Michael A. E209.R39 2013 973.3—dc23 2013028726 British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. An earlier version of William Huntting Howell’s essay appeared as “‘Starving Memory’: Joseph Plumb Martin Un-Tells the Story of the American Revolution” in Common-place 10.2 (January 2010). Publication of this book and other titles in the series Public History in Historical Perspective is supported by the Office of the Dean, College of Humanities and Fine Arts, University of Massachusetts Amherst. In memory of Rhys Isaac “This page intentionally left blank” Contents Acknowledgments xi Introduction The Revolution in American life from 1776 to the Civil War Michael A. McDonnell, Clare Corbould, Frances Clarke, and W. Fitzhugh Brundage 1 Part I The Revolutionary Generation Remembers War and nationhood Founding Myths and Historical Realities Michael A. McDonnell 19 “A natural & unalienable Right” New England Revolutionary Petitions and African American Identity Daniel R. Mandell 41 Forgotten Founder Revolutionary Memory and John Dickinson’s Reputation Peter Bastian 58 The Graveyard Aesthetics of Revolutionary Elegiac verse Remembering the Revolution as a Sacred Cause Evert Jan van Leeuwen 75 vii viii CONTENTS “Starving Memory” Antinarrating the American Revolution William Huntting Howell 93 Public Memories, Private lives The First Greatest Generation Remembers the Revolutionary War Caroline Cox 110 Part II Transmitting Memories “More Than ordinary Patriotism” Living History in the Memory Work of George Washington Parke Custis Seth C. Bruggeman 127 Plagiarism in Pursuit of historical Truth George Chalmers and the Patriotic Legacy of Loyalist History Eileen Ka-May Cheng 144 Emma Willard’s “True Mnemonic of history” America’s First Textbooks, Proto-Feminism, and the Memory of the Revolution Keith Beutler 162 Remembering and Forgetting War, Memory, and Identity in the Post-Revolutionary Mohawk Valley James Paxton 179 “lie There My Darling, While i Avenge Ye!” Anecdotes, Collective Memory, and the Legend of Molly Pitcher Emily Lewis Butterfield 198 Part III Dividing Memories Forgetting history Antebellum American Peace Reformers and the Specter of the Revolution Carolyn Eastman 217 CONTENTS ix “of Course We Claim to Be Americans” Revolution, Memory, and Race in Up-Country Georgia Baptist Churches, 1772–1849 Daryl Black 234 “A Strange and Crowded history” Transnational Revolution and Empire in George Lippard’s Washington and His Generals Tara Deshpande 249 “The Sacred Ashes of the First of Men” Edward Everett, the Mount Vernon Ladies Association of the Union, and Late Antebellum Unionism Matthew Mason 265 Martyred Blood and Avenging Spirits Revolutionary Martyrs and Heroes as Inspiration for the U.S. Civil War Sarah J. Purcell 280 old-Fashioned Tea Parties Revolutionary Memory in Civil War Sanitary Fairs Frances M. Clarke 294 notes on Contributors 313 index 319 “This page intentionally left blank” Acknowledgments The editors gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Australian Research Council, the University of Sydney, Monash University, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in bringing this collection to fruition. We also thank Marla Miller and Clark Dougan for their encour- agement and advice, David Waldstreicher and the other anonymous reader of the manuscript, and the efficient and patient staff at the Uni- versity of Massachusetts Press. At the University of Sydney, Robert Aldrich played an important role as we formulated the project. We were extremely fortunate when Briony Neilson signed on as a research assistant in 2011. We have long appreciated her expertise in collating essays, communicating with authors, copyediting, and indexing. Our great thanks as well to all the contributors, with whom it has been a pleasure to work. Finally, the volume is dedicated to the memory of Rhys Isaac, who died while we were still assembling the collection. Rhys was an enthusiastic supporter of this project from the start, and he looked forward to contrib- uting to it himself. His influence over American history in Australia espe- cially, and us, has been immeasurable; he is sorely missed. MM, CC, FC, and WFB xi “This page intentionally left blank” RememberinThE g R nEvoluTio = “This page intentionally left blank” inTRoDuCTion The Revolution in American life from 1776 to the Civil War = Michael A. McDonnell, Clare Corbould, Frances M. Clarke, and W. Fitzhugh Brundage he American Revolution today is alive and well. Celebrated and revered, it is at the heart of American life. It drives the Tea Party move- ment and fuels history book publishing. It is central to the heritage indus- try and is represented in themed amusement parks. People from television T celebrities to Supreme Court judges wonder aloud what the so-called founders would think about contemporary issues, while living-history actors and amateur reenactors bring to life the Revolution on historic battlefields across the eastern seaboard. Politicians from all parties draw upon stories of what is commonly referred to as the founding era to ani- mate and legitimize diverse agendas. Almost every president since George Washington has cited the importance of the Revolution. George W. Bush noted the enduring legacy of the Revolution in his 2005 inaugural address. Bush observed that when “the Liberty Bell was [first] sounded in celebra- tion, a witness said, ‘It rang as if it meant something.’ In our time it means something still,” Bush concluded.1 1 2 MICHAEL A. MCDONNELL, CLARE CORBOULD, FRANCES M. CLARKE, AND W. FITZHUGH BRUNDAGE For most Americans the meaning of the Revolution stems from how the event is remembered and invoked in the present. Although historians often lament their students’ ignorance of history, when it comes to the Revolution everyone is a historian; everyone remembers “something.”2 Today Americans most often recall tales of a Revolution led by a group of “demi- gods” who towered above their fellow colonists, led them into a war against tyranny, and established a democratic nation dedicated to the proposition that all men were endowed by their creator with equal rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. In these stories a unity of purpose is empha- sized over division. Good triumphed over evil as a small group of men overthrew a tyrannical monarchy and replaced it with a republican gov- ernment, enshrined in one of the world’s first written constitutions. In this telling the American Revolution is a timeless story of the defense of freedom and the rights of all humankind. Above all, it is the story of the founding of a nation. Yet the American Revolution was not always remembered this way. Those who survived the chaotic and complicated events of 1763–89 strug- gled to make sense of the momentous changes that had transformed the original thirteen colonies. Having just lived through eight years of war, white colonists could not help but recall the uncertain, halting, and painful movements toward separation from Britain.