Washington’s Headquarters – Brandywine Battlefield

On the eve of the Battle of Brandywine, George Washington established his headquarters in the home of a Quaker farmer and miller, Benjamin Ring. The house was near Chadd’s Ford where the British were expected to cross the river. With superior tacts and knowledge of the terrain, the British easily outwitted General Washington and the Americans lost the battle September 11th, 1777.

Slide Show of my Photographs, December 2011

The image, Washington’s Headquarters – Benjamin Ring House, is subject to copyright by Edna Barney. It is posted here with permission via the Flickr API by barneykin, an administrator of “The Revolution ed” pool.

The First Virginia Regiment

James Armistead Lafayette

The portrait here is of General Lafayette of Revolutionary War fame. I snapped the portrait hanging on a wall at Bassett Hall in Williamsburg, Virginia.

I recently came upon a story relating to General Lafayette’s servant James. James was an enslaved man of Mr. William Armistead of New Kent County, Virginia. With his master’s consent, James joined the Continental Army and was assigned to serve the Marquis de Lafayette. At the risk of his life, James entered British camps and brought back information to the Marquis. After the war was won, a petition was offered to gain James his freedom and to compensate his master. Adopting the the patronymic of General Lafayette, James Armistead Lafayette began his new life as a free man.

James’s story was found in “Forgotten Patriots.”

The image, Portrait of General Lafayette, is subject to copyright by Edna Barney. It is posted here with permission via the Flickr API by barneykin, an administrator of “The Revolution ed” pool.

Francis Lightfoot Lee

The Average Congressman of the Founding Fathers’s Times

Francis Lightfoot Lee was a signer of the Declaration of Independence. A sketch of the character and life of this Virginian reveals the material that was used in the construction of congressmen in his day. To sketch him is to sketch the average congressman of his time, the time of the Founding Fathers.

He came of an old and excellent family; a family which had borne an unsullied name, and held honorable place on both sides of the water; a family with a reputation to preserve and traditions to perpetuate; a family which could not afford to soil itself with political trickery, or do base things for party or for hire; a family which was able to shed as much honor upon official station as it received from it.

He dealt in no shams; he had no ostentations of dress or equipage; for he was, as one may say, inured to wealth. He had always been used to it. His own ample means were inherited. He was educated. He was more than that – he was finely cultivated. He loved books; he had a good library, and no place had so great a charm for him as that. The old Virginia mansion which was his home was also the home of that old-time Virginian hospitality which hoary men still hold in mellow memory. Over their port and walnuts he and his friends of the gentry discussed a literature which is dead and forgotten now, and political matters which were drowsy with the absence of corruption and “investigations.” Sundays he and they drove to church in their lumbering coaches, with a due degree of grave and seemly pomp. Week-days they inspected their domains, ordered their affairs, attended to the needs of their dependents, consulted with their overseers and tenants, busied themselves with active benevolences. They were justices of the peace, and performed their unpaid duties with arduous and honest diligence, and with serene, unhampered impartiality toward a society to which they were not beholden for their official stations. In short, Francis Lightfoot Lee was a gentleman – a word which meant a great deal in his day, though it means nothing whatever n ours.

Mr. Lee defiled himself with no juggling, or wire-pulling, or begging, to acquire a place in the provincial legislature, but went thither when he was called, and went reluctantly. He wrought there industriously during four years, never seeking his own ends, but only the public’s. His course was purity itself, and he retired unblemished when his work was done. He retired gladly, and sought his home and its superior allurements. No one dreamed of such a thing as “investigating” him.

“Francis Lightfoot Lee” by Mark Twain, 1877 (The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, I, no. 3).

Lee’s Stratford Landing

On 30 March 1781, two hundred thirty years ago, British sailors from armed vessels anchored in the Potomac River near Saint Clement’s [Blackistone] Island, and attempted to land at Stratford Landing as part of a mission to destroy and loot the plantation houses along both sides of the river. From his home Chantilly, which had a good view of the island, Richard Henry Lee, Lieutenant of the Westmoreland militia, watched the movements of the ships. The British launched smaller craft to approach the shoreline while the large ships fired cannons to cover the attack. Richard Henry Lee met them with a small, ill-armed group of local citizens. In the skirmish that followed, the Westmoreland militia repelled the attackers, killing one British sailor who was buried on Stratford beach.

The image, Lee’s Stratford Landing, is subject to copyright by Edna Barney. It is posted here with permission via the Flickr API by barneykin, an administrator of “The Revolution ed” pool.

My DAR Pins

The image, My DAR Pins, is subject to copyright by Edna Barney. It is posted here with permission via the Flickr API by barneykin, an administrator of “The Revolution ed” pool.

Capitalists versus Patriots

Which Came First? The Capitalist or the Patriot?

Capitalism came to America in the early 1600s with The British East India Company & Dutch East India Company. Merchants invested capital in the East India Companies seeking a return on investment, hence “capitalism.” The Patriots of the American Revolution did not come about until circa 1776, with the founding of the United States of America.

The image, Jamestown, Virginia, is subject to copyright by Edna Barney. It is posted here with permission via the Flickr API by barneykin, an administrator of “The Revolution ed” pool.

George Washington’s Birthday

General George Washington — “A good moral character is the first essential in a man.”

This life size display of General Washington as Commander in Chief is from the museum center at his Mount Vernon plantation in Virginia.

The image, Museum at Mount Vernon, is subject to copyright by Edna Barney. It is posted here with permission via the Flickr API by barneykin, an administrator of “The Revolution ed” pool.

Tun Tavern

“The Legend” – On 10 November 1775, the Second Continental Congress resolved that two battalions of Marines be raised. The Continental Marines were born that day. According to legend, Captain Samuel Nicholas set up shop in Philadelphia’s Tun Tavern and began recruiting. The rest is history. On 11 July 1798, an act of Congress created The United States Marine Corps.

The Tun Tavern has been recreated at The National Museum of the Marine Corps at Triangle, Virginia./p>

The image, The Tun Tavern, is subject to copyright by Edna Barney. It is posted here with permission via the Flickr API by barneykin, an administrator of “The Revolution ed” pool.

Americans Rewrite Their Own History

President Andrew Jackson was NOT impeached. It was Andrew JOHNSON who was impeached. Only two US Presidents have ever been impeached: Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton, and both were acquitted in the Senate. However, it is Revolutionary War soldier and War of 1812 hero who is now castigated as “impeached” and it cannot be corrected, as modern-day Americans have concluded that if he was not impeached, he should have been.

The image, Andrew Jackson, is subject to copyright by Edna Barney. It is posted here with permission via the Flickr API by barneykin, an administrator of “The Revolution ed” pool.