From Loyalists to Loyal Citizens

From Loyalists to Loyal Citizens
Author: Valerie H. McKito
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 262
Release: 2015-08-10
Genre: History
ISBN: 143845810X

Challenges the traditional perception that Loyalists were ostracized as traitors to the United States, after the American Revolution. The DePeyster family of New York was one of the first families of New Amsterdam, ranking among the wealthiest of New York during the early days of the American Republic. The DePeysters were also unapologetic Loyalists, serving in the King’s forces during the American Revolution. After the war, the four sons left the United States for Canada and Great Britain. Ten years later, one son, Frederick DePeyster, returned to New York, embraced his Loyalist past, and utilized his British connections to become a prominent and successful merchant. The DePeysters went on to become true Patriots, zealously supporting US interests in the War of 1812. This book examines the forces at work in the lives of the DePeyster family and the decisions they made to navigate their way from loyal subjects of the British crown to loyal citizens of the United States. How this transformation occurred challenges many of the preconceived ideas we hold both about the Revolution and the formation of the American identity in the years following the war. “From Loyalists to Loyal Citizens recasts the image of the Loyalist into a more sympathetic mold. These people were not one-dimensional ideologues, but human beings, with all the concerns, cares, and hopes of other Americans. McKito has crafted a persuasive study of Loyalists in the aftermath of the tumultuous Revolutionary War, looking at the DePeyster family of New York to understand how many Loyalists returned from exile and successfully reconciled themselves with the young American republic.” — Joshua M. Smith, author of Borderland Smuggling: Patriots, Loyalists, and Illicit Trade in the Northeast, 1783–1820 “From Loyalists to Loyal Citizens is an intriguing look at exiled Loyalist Frederick DePeyster and his family and how easily they reentered the society and business world of republican New York. Both former Loyalists and Patriots quickly returned to the goal of making money. The account of life in Canada is especially good.” — Philip Ranlet, author of The New York Loyalists: Second Edition

The Loyalist Conscience

The Loyalist Conscience
Author: Chaim M. Rosenberg
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 233
Release: 2018-09-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 1476672458

Freedom of speech was restricted during the Revolutionary War. In the great struggle for independence, those who remained loyal to the British crown were persecuted with loss of employment, eviction from their homes, heavy taxation, confiscation of property and imprisonment. Loyalist Americans from all walks of life were branded as traitors and enemies of the people. By the end of the war, 80,000 had fled their homeland to face a dismal exile from which few would return, outcasts of a new republic based on democratic values of liberty, equality and justice.

Dishonored Americans

Dishonored Americans
Author: Timothy Compeau
Publisher: University of Virginia Press
Total Pages: 229
Release: 2023-11-29
Genre: History
ISBN: 0813950473

With the final words of the Declaration of Independence, the signatories famously pledged to one another their lives, their fortunes, and their "sacred Honor." But what about those who made the opposite choice? By looking through the analytical lens of honor culture, Dishonored Americans offers an innovative assessment of the experience of Americans who made the fateful decision to remain loyal to the British Crown during and after the Revolution. Loyalists, as Timothy Compeau explains, suffered a "political death" at the hands of American Patriots. A term drawn from eighteenth-century sources, ‘political death’ encompassed the legal punishments and ritualized dishonors Patriots used to defeat Loyalist public figures and discredit their counter-revolutionary vision for America. By highlighting this dynamic, Compeau makes a significant intervention in the long-standing debate over the social and cultural factors that motivated colonial Americans to choose sides in the conflict, narrating in compelling detail the severe consequences for once-respected gentlemen who were stripped of their rights, privileges, and power in Revolutionary America.

Irish Political Studies Reader

Irish Political Studies Reader
Author: Conor McGrath
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 488
Release: 2007-10-18
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1134064365

This is an introduction to the best available scholarship within Irish politics, featuring the most influential and significant articles which have been published on Irish politics during the past twenty years. Each article is accompanied by a new commentary by another leading scholar which addresses the impact and contribution of the article and discusses how its themes remain crucial today. The book covers all the most important topics within Irish politics including political culture and traditions, political institutions and parties and the peace process. The combination of the best original scholarship and contemporary commentaries on the core political issues makes Irish Political Studies Reader an invaluable resource for all students and scholars of Irish politics.

American Loyalist Troops 1775–84

American Loyalist Troops 1775–84
Author: René Chartrand
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 141
Release: 2013-01-20
Genre: History
ISBN: 147280032X

To celebrate the 450th title in the Men-at-Arms series, this book examines in much more depth than previously the units and the uniforms of a still-controversial army: the many thousands of American colonists who chose to fight for King George during the Revolution. As well as the better-known corps from the Atlantic seaboard, the author covers the units raised for service against the Spanish in the Floridas, the Caribbean islands and Central America. The text is illustrated with portraits, photographs of rare surviving artefacts, and with color reconstructions by Gerry Embleton, the respected expert on 18th century American forces whose work was recently exhibited in the Smithsonian Institute.

Loyalism and the Formation of the British World

Loyalism and the Formation of the British World
Author: Allan Blackstock
Publisher: Boydell & Brewer Ltd
Total Pages: 312
Release: 2014
Genre: History
ISBN: 1843839121

Explores loyalism as a social and political force in eighteenth and nineteenth century British colonies and former colonies.

Royalism, War and Popular Politics in the Age of Revolutions, 1780s-1870s

Royalism, War and Popular Politics in the Age of Revolutions, 1780s-1870s
Author: Andoni Artola
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 262
Release: 2023-09-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 3031295110

This book offers a ground-breaking approach to royalism and popular politics in Europe and the Americas during the Age of Revolutions. It shows how royalist and counterrevolutionary movements did not propose a mere return to the past, but rather introduced an innovative way of addressing the demands and expectations of various social groups. Ordinary people were involved in the war and adapted the traditional imaginary of the monarchy to craft new models of political participation. This edited collection brings together scholars from France, Spain, Norway, and Mexico, to provide a transatlantic comparative perspective. It is a must-read for scholars and students looking to discover the lesser-known side of the Age of Revolutions, and the motivations of those who fought in the name of the king.

The Founders and Finance

The Founders and Finance
Author: Thomas K. McCraw
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 561
Release: 2012-10-08
Genre: History
ISBN: 0674071352

In 1776 the United States government started out on a shoestring and quickly went bankrupt fighting its War of Independence against Britain. At the war’s end, the national government owed tremendous sums to foreign creditors and its own citizens. But lacking the power to tax, it had no means to repay them. The Founders and Finance is the first book to tell the story of how foreign-born financial specialists—immigrants—solved the fiscal crisis and set the United States on a path to long-term economic success. Pulitzer Prize–winning author Thomas K. McCraw analyzes the skills and worldliness of Alexander Hamilton (from the Danish Virgin Islands), Albert Gallatin (from the Republic of Geneva), and other immigrant founders who guided the nation to prosperity. Their expertise with liquid capital far exceeded that of native-born plantation owners Washington, Jefferson, and Madison, who well understood the management of land and slaves but had only a vague knowledge of financial instruments—currencies, stocks, and bonds. The very rootlessness of America’s immigrant leaders gave them a better understanding of money, credit, and banks, and the way each could be made to serve the public good. The remarkable financial innovations designed by Hamilton, Gallatin, and other immigrants enabled the United States to control its debts, to pay for the Louisiana Purchase of 1803, and—barely—to fight the War of 1812, which preserved the nation’s hard-won independence from Britain.