Interpretations of Southern Loyalists in theHistoriography of the American Revolution

Peter Taylor1

Professor Mark FisselMMH 510: Introduction to History and Military History

November 13, 2011

11. This paper was peer reviewed by Kevin Keaney, for whose assistance I am very grateful.

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It is challenging to write about what historians have said about Southern Loyalists during

the Revolutionary War. Britain’s Southern Campaign, fought between 1780 and 1781, was

exceedingly brutal. Battles were poorly documented and fought by irregular forces deep in the

forests of Georgia and the Carolinas. One result of this type of conflict is a dearth of primary

documentation about its participants, especially those who fought for the Crown. Few Loyalist

accounts from the 18th century have been published in the United States. Fewer still have their

origins in, or are concerned with, the Revolutionary South. Of the works that were produced,

almost none discuss the activities of Loyalists in and of themselves.2 American historians,

including those living below the Mason-Dixon Line, did not write substantively about the region

or its role in the war before 1840.3 The Civil War, the 800-pound gorilla of American history,

has also left its mark on the historiography of the section as well, first disrupting and then

eclipsing the in-depth examination of historical periods outside of the 19th century.

The historiographic landscape of this subject underwent a dramatic change during the

1960s, however. A resurgence of interest in the Revolution spawned a number of significant

works about the Southern Campaign. Many monographs and articles were written on the military

history of the region. Reflecting the Modernist School tradition, the lives of disenfranchised

groups like the Loyalists were examined. It is from this last school that most works on this

subject may be found. Because of disinterest evidenced by early American scholars, the long

shadow of the Civil War, and a virtual cascade of recent materials, the historiography of the

Revolutionary War in the South and the role of Loyalist in it is fundamentally distorted. This

paper will explore this phenomenon by examining the historic views of Southern Loyalist,

21. This paper was peer reviewed by Kevin Keaney, for whose assistance I am very grateful.2. Robert F. Calhoon, Loyalists in Revolutionary America, 1760–1781 (New York, 1973), 499.3. John Hope Franklin, “The North, the South, and the American Revolution,” The Journal of

American History 62, no. 1 (1975): 6.

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discussing how this subject has evolved over time and accessing the current state of the

historiography of this remarkable subject.

One of the earliest existing accounts of the Colonial South and her people was written by

an itinerate Anglican minister in the late 1760s. Charles Woodmason’s vivid description of the

wilderness of the Carolina backcountry illuminates social factors that would shape the coming

war and spelled doom for the British plans to invade the South.4 These factors included an

untamed frontier region with a low population density, a marked lack of institutions that would

promote civil society or reinforce bonds with the British Government, and roaming bands of

brigands who were hunted by equally ruthless militia bands of ‘regulators.’ These factors led to a

pessimistic view of the role and utility of government among the people in the back country.

According to Woodmason, rural Southerners were Loyalist-leaning despite the fact that the

existing government ignored them and held them in contempt.5 Since a new representative

government was not likely to do anything for them either, “the Back Inhabitants agree in

Sentiment…that it is better to have ‘one’, than ‘many’ masters.6 In a marked contrast to the rural

areas was the sophistication of the Southern coastal cities; the most prominent was Charleston, in

South Carolina. The site of South Carolina’s Royalist Government and a primary center for

trade, Charleston was surrounded by plantations of wealthy planters and slaveholders. On the

eve of the Revolution, many potential Southern Loyalists were either poor, rural and

underserved by a Government who took their allegiance for granted, or were drawn from among

the most wealthy and important people in Southern Colonial society. These two contrasting 44. For more on British estimates of Loyalist sympathies, see Smith, Paul H., “The American

Loyalists: Notes on Their Organization and Numerical Strength.”The William and Mary Quarterly 25, no. 2 (1968): 259-277.

5. Charles Woodmason The Carolina Backcountry on the Eve of the Revolution ed. Richard J.Hooker (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1953), xxv. South Carolina’s Governor, James Glenn, “compared the people’s manners to those of Indians, and he found one man fifty years of age who had never seen a church, a minister, a ship, or a ‘great gun’.”

6 Ibid., 266.

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views, savage backwoodsmen or landed aristocracy, were to have a significant impact on future

interpretations of Loyalists.

The first generation of historians, people who had actually witnessed the war, were less

interested in an analysis of the Revolution than they were in proving the justice of their cause.

Thomas Paine summed up the feelings of many revolutionaries towards their Colonial fellows in

The Crisis:

And what is a Tory? Good God! What is he? I should not be afraid to go with a hundred

Whigs against a thousand Tories, were they to attempt to get into arms. Every Tory is a

coward; for servile, slavish, self-interested fear is the foundation of Toryism; and a man

under such influence, though he may be cruel, never can be brave.7

Following the war, both sides wrote highly subjective biographies and narratives. One of

the most significant early narratives of the American historiography of the war comes from an

author who lived in Charleston. Dr. David Ramsay’s History of the American Revolution in

South Carolina, from a British Province to an Independent State is one of the first works to

mention Southern Loyalists. Ramsay explains that British failure in the Southern campaign was

partially due to the British Government’s overestimation of Loyalist abilities and numbers.8 This

statement is part of a trend in American Revolutionary historiography that continued for some

time. The number of Loyalists is downplayed in future consensus interpretations. Although the

numbers were small, they were not insignificant.

In England and elsewhere, Loyalist historians began writing as well. Peter Oliver, the

former chief justice of the Superior Court of Massachusetts, and Thomas Hutchinson, the last

77. Thomas Paine, “The Crisis,” Thomas Paine. USHistory.Org, http://www.ushistory.org/paine/ crisis/singlehtml.htm.

8. Paul David Nelson, “British Conduct of the American Revolutionary War: A Review of Interpretations.” The Journal of American History 65, no. 3 (1978): 628.

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royal governor of the province of Massachusetts, wrote The Origin and Progress of the

American Rebellion and History of the Province of Massachusetts Bay respectively. Like many

works from this period, the writing was often highly subjective and made few attempts at

impartiality. Oliver’s work, for instance, was “...full of apoplectic judgments on the Patriot

opposition and of saccharine paragraphs on fellow Loyalists.”9 Others, like Hutchinson, were

more balanced. Both offered an alternate view of the Revolution, one that documented violence

and intimidation of Loyalists by Patriots.10

These writings did not significantly impact the nascent American historiography of the

conflict, however. The reason is that another trend emerges at this point. American historians

seem to have assumed that Loyalist accounts were inherently less reliable than those of Patriot

writers. This is suggested by the fact that many Loyalist works, even those with authors as highly

placed as Oliver and Hutchinson (and, it must be inferred, firsthand insights into significant

political and social events), languished for years or even centuries before making their way into

the American historiography. While these products of Northern Loyalists fared poorly, Southern

accounts, like Woodmason’s, were even more rare and would wait longer for acknowledgement

from historians. In the immediate aftermath of the war, the Loyalists were defined by loss. They

were absent, having fled the country or were lying low in hopes of being ignored by their

neighbors. Most found themselves bereft of their former status and, especially in the South, their

property.11

9. Malcoln Freiberg, review of Peter Oliver's Origin & Progress of the American Rebellion: A Tory View, by Peter Oliver, The Mississippi Valley Historical Review 48, no. 4 (1962): 693-694.10 10. Robert M. Calhoon, review of Peter Oliver's Origin & Progress of the American Rebellion: A Tory View, by Peter Oliver, The William and Mary Quarterly 19, no. 2 (1962): 303-304. Calhoon analyses the author’s reports of strong arm tactics used by the Patriots including smuggling, tar and feathering, and jJury intimidation.

11. Robert S. Lambert, “The Confiscation of Loyalist Property in Georgia, 1782-1786.” The William and Mary Quarterly 20, no. 1 (1963): 80-94.

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The role of the Loyalists was examined in greater detail with the rise of the Whig or

Nationalist School of history. Beginning in the early 19th century, the Whigs interpreted the

Revolution, and the war that accompanied it, as a reaction to the Britain’s usurpation of the rights

and liberties of American colonists. Leading historians of this school, like George Bancroft,

painted the war as a contest between the morally virtuous Americans and the dissolute, corrupt,

and, most importantly, tyrannical British Empire. The Revolution itself was seen as the logical

conclusion to an inevitable, perhaps divinely inspired, spread of liberty. This interpretation

sought to portray the Revolution as a product of a universal consensus among the colonies and

had little use for the Loyalists, whose inconvenient existence argued against the Whig view. As

might be expected, this school was very hostile to Loyalists, viewing them as a small minority of

villains and traitors. This would be the first of many roles Loyalists would play in the national

narrative. Most of the work during this period focuses specifically on the experience of the

Northern states.

One exception to this trend was the writing of Lorenzo Sabine. Published in 1847, his

book, The American Loyalist or Biographical Sketches of Adherents to the British Crown in the

Revolution, was the first work to systematically investigate Loyalist activity in the South. In it,

Sabine maintains that “Loyalist sentiment in the South was so strong that the section’s

contribution to the winning of independence was extremely limited and, on the whole, without

effect.” 12 Sabine implied that even the Southerners willing to fight for the cause would be

limited in their participation because of concern about slave rebellions in their absence. This

association between slavery and tyranny (at least in the minds of the Northern public) may be

12. Lorenzo Sabine, The American Loyalist or Biographical Sketches of Adherents to the British Crown in the Revolution (Boston, 1847) 30, 32, as quoted in John Hope Franklin “The North, the South, and the American Revolution.” The Journal of American History 62, no. 1 (1975): 5-23.

13. Charles M. Oliver, Critical companion to Walt Whitman: a literary reference to his life and work (New York: Infobase Publishing, 2006), 46-47.

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seen in the satirical “A Boston Ballad,” written in part to protest the passage of the Kansas-

Nebraska Bill. In it, Walt Whitman salutes George III with the words “You have got your

revenge, old buster - the crown is come to its own, and more than its own.” 13 These attacks on

Southern participation in the War for Independence, especially considered in the light of the

misery South endured during the 1780’s, were singularly unfair and largely without merit. In any

case, this verbal war, couched in historical terms but really addressing unbridgeable sectionalist

divides, would soon be replaced by a very real one of catastrophic proportions. So great were the

effects of the Civil War that scholarly works on the Revolutionary South disappeared from the

historiography for the remainder of the century.

At the end of the 19th century, two new approaches to American history emerged. The

Progressive School rejected the Whig idea of consensus and, influenced by Socialist thought,

held that the Revolution was driven by competing economic concerns and deep class divisions.

Leading historians of this school, such as Charles Beard, wrote titles like An Economic

Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States, leaving little doubt as to the thrust of this

school’s argument. Another scholar, Claude Van Tyne, looked at Loyalists through the

Progressive lens in his book The Loyalist in the American Revolution. Van Tyne provided a

relatively sympathetic examination of the banishment of Loyalists in terms of the cost in

economic prosperity.14 As this may suggest, Progressives viewed Loyalists, especially in the

South, as a landed aristocracy that feared losing their property in the anarchy of the Revolution.

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14 14. Van Tyne, Claude Halstead. The Loyalist in the American Revolution. London: MacMillan & Co., 1902.

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Doubtless, earlier accounts, like those of Dr. Ramsey, played a role in this perception. The

‘Wealthy Loyalist’ was duly entered into the canon of types alongside ‘traitor.’

Another school of interpretation, the Imperial School, took an interest in documentation

available in British archives in the early 1900s. The Imperialist scholars sought to fit American

history into a larger European narrative. Active at the same time as the Progressive School and

often at odds with the Whig interpretation of the war, scholars of the Imperial School saw the

war as a product of misunderstandings or missed opportunities for reconciliation. Loyalists,

understandably, were treated with more sympathy by these historians. Loyalist motives were

examined in The Literary History of the American Revolution 1763-1783, for the first time

without the heavy symbolism imposed upon them by the earlier schools. The author, Moses Coit

Tyler, undertook a nuanced analysis of the type and character of the Loyalist. His conclusions

were that the Loyalist stance was as much a product of conscience as of self-interest. He also

observed that Loyalist, as a group, constituted a broad spectrum of society, not just special-

interest groups like politicians or plantation owners.15 In fact, Richard Morris, writing in the

populist vein some years later, maintained that “…from Maryland South, the proportion of

Loyalists was manifestly higher among the lower classes than among the first families.”16

The period after World War II marked another change in the interpretations of the

Revolution. Scholars of the Neo-Whig School believed that the American colonists fought to

keep, instead of create, a representative-style ggovernment. Bernard Bailyn, in The Ideological

Origins of the American Revolution, argued that participatory institutions already existed in some

form in the colonies and that there was a united consensus about ggovernment in the colonies. In

1515. Moses Coit Tyler, The Literary History of the American Revolution 1763-1783 (New York: The Knickerbocker Press, 1897), 291-315.16 16. Richard B. Morris, “Class Struggle and the American Revolution,” The William and Mary Quarterly 19, no. 1 (1962): 27.

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other words, the Revolution was a conservative action, not a radical one, and the colonists only

decided for war when they became convinced that the British intended to limit their rights.

Works like The Ordeal of Thomas Hutchinson critically examined the decisions made by the

former Governor (a proponent of the much hated Stamp Act, among others) in order to explore

the difference between Loyalist and non-Loyalist ideologies. In this school, Loyalists were seen

as both the beneficiaries and the defenders of hereditary privilege. Loyalists, therefore, stood for

self-interests and against a new ggovernment that promised better representation and rewards

based not on outdated social hierarchies, but on merit.

The revolution in social thought that accompanied the 1960s brought a new school of

interpretation to the fore. The Modernist School was rooted in the Progressive School and

influenced by the tools of the social sciences. The Modernist School was concerned with the

experiences of the ‘unvoiced’ people of history. This focus extended to under-examined topics

and regions of the Revolutionary period, including the Colonial South. Interests in the story of

minority groups like Native or African Americans led to the exploration of shared common

experiences, such as identification with the Loyalist cause during the Revolutionary War.17 Of

particular importance and representative of the new field of study was William H. Nelson's

American Tory, published in 1962. Beatrice Hofstadter captures the sentiments of this school

when she notes that for a long time the subject of Loyalists was “…no more than biographical

scraps strung together with apologetics.”18 One of the leading lights of this nascent field was

Robert Calhoon, who identified the need for Loyalist studies and promoted the belief that to

dismiss Loyalist behavior was to limit understanding of the Revolution. The majority of all

17 17. See, for example, Jeffery J. Crows, “Slave Rebelliousness and Social Conflict in North

Carolina, 1775 to 1802.” The William and Mary Quarterly 37, no. 1 (1980): 79-102. 18 18. Hofstadter, Beatrice K. Review of The Loyalists in Revolutionary America, 1760-1781, by Robert Mccluer Calhoon. The American Historical Review 80, no. 2 (1975): 487-488.

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existing materials about the Southern Loyalist experience are drawn from the historians of this

school.

Works selected for this paper can be separated into a few broad categories. There is the

examination of notable Loyalists, like Thomas Brown in Edward Cashin’s The King’s Ranger.

There is the study of Loyalists before, during, and after the war, like South Carolina Loyalists in

the American Revolution, by Robert Stansbury Lambert. There is also the examination of

Loyalist within the greater Colonial society, such as James Piecuch’s Three Peoples, One King:

Loyalists, Indians, and Slaves in the Revolutionary South, 1775—1782. Accounts of the war as it

relates to the Southern Campaign may be found in Walter B. Edgar’s Partisans and Red Coats:

The Southern Conflict That Turned the Tide of the American Revolution. Writings on the theory

and practice of Colonial military history in both the ‘old’ and ‘new’ style approaches to

interpretation abound. For a study of the historiography of the study of the Revolutionary War,

see Wayne E. Lee’s Early American Ways of War: A New Reconnaissance. An outstanding

example of a mixed approach to a battle in the Southern Campaign is Devil of a Whipping: The

Battle of Cowpens, by Lawrence E. Babits. While confining his book to the examination of a

single battle, Babits’ research also accessed pension records and first-person accounts in a

mixture of research techniques used to establish unprecedented details. The focus on individual

soldiers puts this book firmly in the modernist camp but also in the ‘old’ military history

tradition.

Loyalists have been portrayed in the American historiography as a kind of chimera, a

figure that continually shifts into the thing that best expressed the antithesis of the interpreting

school. Loyalists have been, alternately, savage denizens of the back country, wealthy plantation

owners, enemies of the Revolution, treacherous relics of a disreputable feudal monarchy and

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even, misunderstood men of conscience. It seemed that in the 1980s, Loyalist were finally poised

to take their place in the national narrative. Unfortunately, this was not the case.

Under the influence of Postmodernism, research in this field continued to fragment into

smaller and increasingly specialized histories. Thus there are not Loyalists, but Loyalist women,

Loyalist slaves, Loyalist partisans, etc. The Postmodernist influence has removed either the

ability or the will to associate the experiences of individuals within a grand interpretation.

Definitive motives for the Loyalist mindset have not been established in the historiography.

While many exciting and well-researched works exist, a Loyalist synthesis still remains elusive.

One side effect of this heavy fragmentation into subfields is the welcome reintroduction of

narrative storytelling. Without a particular school to relate to, all that is left is to tell the Loyalist

story well.

This analysis of the current historiography lends itself to several conclusions. The first is

that the thesis supported by many historians in this school is that the Revolutionary War in the

South was, in effect, a civil war. The use of hit and run raids, the practice of targeting civilians,

and the reliance on irregular troops drawn from communities where neighbor might be pitted

against neighbor are all the hallmarks of such a conflict. It is the presence of a substantial

Loyalist population, however, that is the most convincing element of this argument. In one

survey, Paul Smith concludes that Loyalists comprised perhaps 20 percent of the white

population in the thirteen revolting colonies.19 Of these, perhaps half of the Loyalists fled to

Canada or other parts of the Empire after the war. To bring home the scale of this evacuation in

today’s terms would require a group of people that exceeded the entire population of New York

City and Los Angeles combined (~12,000,000 citizens) to leave the U.S. tomorrow. While the

19 19. Paul H. Smith, The American Loyalists: Notes on Their Organization and Numerical Strength.” The William and Mary Quarterly 25, no. 2 (1968): 259-277.

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impact of such a change would be undisputed, it is curiously under-examined in the

historiography. The white population in the Confederacy numbered approximately 5.5 million –

or something just shy of 20% of the 31 million citizens identified in the 1860 census of the

United States.20 John S. Pancake makes an excellent argument for this view in This Destructive

War: The British Campaign in the Carolinas, 1780-1782. An acknowledgement of the

significance of the Loyalist population in South Carolina and elsewhere seriously challenges the

consensus history put forward by the Whigs and Neo-Whigs.

Another conclusion is that the War for Independence was won in the South. The British

undertook the Southern Campaign in the belief that the stalemate in the North could be broken

by decisive victories in the South. It was not to be. Although the surrender of Cornwallis at

Yorktown is recognized as the definitive defeat of the British army, the battles leading up to that

event, such as the battle of Kings Mountain (with its victory over the Loyalists) and Cowpens (a

victory over British Regulars) occurred in the hinterlands of North and South Carolina. A

comprehensive view of the Southern role may be seen in Henry Lumpkin’s From Savannah to

Yorktown: The American Revolution in the South.

Finally, the lack of primary sources and the domination of this subject by the Modernist

and Postmodernist Schools substantially distort the understanding of Loyalists in the

historiography. Primary sources for Loyalist studies, such as Peter Oliver's works, were collected

and published only recently. In other words, even the primary sources are a product of this recent

school of historical interpretation. Although the research associated with this paper is necessarily

constrained by the author’s level of experience and the materials available, It appears that at least

half of all work available about this subject has been created in the last 30 years.

2020. U.S. Civil War Centennial Commission, Facts about the Civil War. Washington, D.C. GPO, 1959.

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In summary, the study of Loyalists is a popular subfield with much unexplored territory

to investigate. It boasts some excellent historians on the Revolutionary period and, judging from

the large number of popular monographs and scholarly articles, is currently quite ‘healthy.’

Much information, especially in the form of primary documentation, remains to be discovered

and interpreted. The historiography of this subject reflects limited interest by early American

scholars balanced (or perhaps overwhelmed) by great deal of recent interest. The Loyalist in

general and the Southern Loyalist in particular have been viewed through a variety of lenses by

historians, most of them profoundly unflattering. Loyalist writings, until recently, have been all

but ignored, much to the detriment of the understanding of the Revolution in America. Although

the current scrutiny of the subject promises to yield more information about these individuals, a

definitive synthesis of Loyalist motivations remains elusive.

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Bibliography

Anderson, Fredrick. Review of The King’s Ranger by Edward Cashin. The Journal of American History 77, no. 3 (1990): 998-999.Anderson marks the sympathetic treatment of Thomas Brown in the book. Also noted are Brown’s origins in, and emigration from, Yorkshire, England. Discussed is Brown’s torture and maiming at the hands of a Patriot mob, his key role in the mobilization of the Creek and Cherokee (in GA and SC) and his eventual promotion to Indian Commissioner. Important resources in the book include biographies of 35 ‘major players’ central to Brown’s story and the history of South Carolina.

Babits, Lawrence Edward. A Devil of a Whipping: The Battle of Cowpens. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1998. Babits examines the pyrrhic British victory at the battle of Cowpens and how it marked a crucial turning point in the war for the Continental forces. American leader Daniel Morgan is cast as a central figure and credited with the use of regular and militia forces to win a strategic victory. The author uses a variety of untapped data source including pension records to establish unprecedented details about the individual soldiers in the battle. The focus on individual soldiers puts this book firmly in the modernist camp but also in the ‘old’ military history tradition.

Blassingame, John W. “American Nationalism and Other Loyalties in the SouthernColonies 1763-1775.” The Journal of Southern History 34, no.1 (1968): 50-75. Blassingame discusses the concept of national loyalty to the United States and the South’s role in its development. The relative neglect of the South by historians in their studies of American nationalism (as of 1968) is noted. The author characterizes Southerners as initially loyal to the British crown but argues that factors like non-English emigration and institutional differences like electoral processes gradually changed how Southerners viewed themselves and the crown.

Breen, T.H. American Insurgents, American Patriots: The Revolution of the People Before Independence. New York: Hill & Wang. 2010. This is a study of the war from the ground up with an emphasis on the role of networks and committees formed by Patriots. The book explores how the Patriots used social pressure and legal procedures to leverage political power and also touches on the role that evangelical religion played in this strategy. The author suggests that common New Englanders, outraged by perceived British military excesses, may have pressured Congress into a more radical course of action than it would have pursued otherwise. This is a modernist historical work.

Brooks, Collin. Review of South Carolina Loyalists in the American Revolution, by RobertStansbury Lambert. The English Historical Review 106, no. 419 (1991): 476-477.

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The author focuses on Lambert’s analysis of the evacuation or accommodation/ reintegration of Loyalists after the war. He also follow-up on Lambert’s self-acknowledged failure to fully explain Loyalist motivations. Lambert’s conclusion that Loyalist were to be found primarily in the interior, as opposed to the urban centers, isexplored as is his suggestion that the odds always favored the Patriots.

Brown, Wallace. The King’s Friends: The Composition and Motives of the American Loyalist Claimants. Providence: Brown University Press, 1965.Brown analyzed the claims (chums) that Loyalists filed with the British Governmentafter the war in order to try to understand who the Loyalists were. His analysis revealed that the most claims were from New York and Georgia. He also determined that Loyalist were primarily urban but identified concentrations of Loyalists in the Southern interior.

Cashin, Edward. The King’s Ranger. New York: Fordham University Press, 1999. A study on the experience of Loyalist in the Southern back country and the eventual migration of disenfranchised Tories. The book is extremely well-researched and provides biographies of many important personalities of the period. The author paints a sympathetic picture of Thomas Brown, the man who helped shape British military strategy in the Southern theater and mobilized the Creek and Cherokee Indians to join the British side during the war. The book addresses the social and political complexity of backwoods warfare. For example, Cashin provides a narrative of hit-and-run raids by freebooters, clashes with whom were as frequent as those between Loyalist and Patriots.

Calhoon, Robert M. Review of Peter Oliver's Origin & Progress of the American Rebellion: A Tory View, by Peter Oliver. The William and Mary Quarterly 19, no. 2 (1962): 303-304.Calhoon’s uses his review of Oliver’s work to refute what he terms as “recent authors” (1962) suggestions that the Revolutionary War was a conservative (i.e., Neo-Whig) movement He also notes that the editors address the neglect of Loyalist studies and the assumption on the part of (American) historians that Loyalist accounts of the war are somehow less reliable than Patriot ones. Calhoon analyzes the author’s reports of strong arm tactics used by the Patriots including smuggling, tar and feathering, and jury intimidation. Oliver’s reliance on the ‘natural sciences’ to back his claims of Loyalist legitimacy are examined.

Calhoon, Robert, ed., Tory Insurgents: The Loyalist Perception and Other Essays. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2010. This is a collection of articles that explore the political and social motivations of Loyalists in the Carolinas. Calhoun suggests that the Loyalist movement was doomed from the start because Loyalists shared no common ideology that could unite them in the way the Patriots were united. The author also points out how British military policy frequently undermined the Loyalist cause either through lack of military support or through the adoption of harsh tactics that further enraged the colonist and induced many to adopt the Patriot cause.

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Calhoon, Robert. Review of Three Peoples, One King: Loyalists, Indians, and Slaves in the Revolutionary South, 1775—1782, by James Piecuch. Journal of Military History 73, no. 2 (2009): 635-637.Calhoon says that Piecuch’s narrative stresses the fluidity of the military, political, and social situation in the South and examines what is implicitly understood to be a tri-racial alliance contract between the monarchy and its loyal allies. Piecuch breaks down the issues by colony and region, examining the lives of slaves and Indians as well as whites. Calhoon is especially satisfied with the use of Campbell’s Journal, a hereto untapped, first person account.

Conway, Stephen. “To Subdue America: British Army Officers and the Conduct of the Revolutionary War.” The William and Mary Quarterly 43, no. 3 (1986): 381-407. Conway discusses British awareness of the unconventional nature of the American conflict and how the British attempted to win the hearts and minds of the population. The author addresses how the distinctive features of American life, participatory Government, well- established militias, and the expectation that injuries would be addressed ensured that the war was less a struggle for territory (on the European model) and more of a contest for political allegiance. Conway argues that there were deep divisions among the British military leadership and that hardliners, like the infamous Tarleton, doomed the conciliatory ‘hearts and minds’ campaign of men like Clinton and Howe.

Crow, Jeffrey J. “Slave Rebelliousness and Social Conflict in North Carolina, 1775 to 1802.” The William and Mary Quarterly 37, no. 1 (1980): 79-102. This article touches on the changes that took place to the relationship between slaves and their owners during and after the Revolutionary War. Crow argues that the war, with its promise of emancipation for blacks loyal to the British, permanently damaged race relations and left a lasting scar on Southern society. The legacy of the Revolution, Crow maintains, left slaves with a greater sense of community and hope for the future.

Edgar, Walter B. Partisans and Red Coats: The Southern Conflict that Turned the Tide of the American Revolution. New York: HarperCollins, 2001. This book establishes the vital importance of the Southern Campaign and chronicles what Edgar maintains was a terror campaign conducted against civilians by the British and their Loyalist allies.

Freiberg, Malcoln. Review of Peter Oliver's Origin & Progress of the American Rebellion: A Tory View, by Peter Oliver. The Mississippi Valley Historical Review 48, no. 4 (1962): 693-694.This short review highlights Oliver’s highly partisan approach. Freiberg characterizes his approach to the Whigs as ‘savage’ and to the Loyalist as ‘saccharin.’ Oliver’s work is

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mainly concerned with the Massachusetts region and has little bearing on the Southern experience of the Revolutionary War.

Franklin, John Hope. “The North, the South, and the American Revolution.” The Journal of American History 62, no. 1 (1975): 5-23.

Franklin develops a brief historiography of the Revolutionary War and the South’s struggle for recognition of its contributions to the war. He maintains that the historiography of the War written during the half-century after its close can “hardly be regarded as notable.” Franklin demonstrates the limited interest the war had for Southern authors before 1840 and the means by which Northerners used the Revolutionary War history to attack Southern institutions.

Furlong, Patrick J. “Civilian-Military Conflict and the Restoration of the Royal Province of Georgia, 1778-1782.” The Journal of Southern History 38, no. 3 (1972): 415-442. Furlong addresses the British attempt to hold Georgia. This article covers the detailed plans the British had for Georgia and especially the role of its well-respected Governor, Sir James Wright. Wright is credited as a moderating influence in this divisive conflict who hoped to strike a conciliatory peace with the rebel Government. The author explores Wrights plans for an independent (British) Florida that could act as a refuge for Loyalist after the war.

Gordon, John W. Review of Devil of a Whipping: The Battle of Cowpens, by Lawrence E. Babits. The Journal of Southern History 66, no. 2 (2000): 391-393. In his review of Babits book, Gordon focuses on the significance of the British defeat and how it broke the string of victories the army had enjoyed in the South. Called out for special attention is Babits’ ‘top down’ comprehensive account, making use of multiple data sources including land grants, pension records, and participant accounts.

Hamer, Philip M. “John Stuart's Indian Policy During the Early Months of the American Revolution.” The Mississippi Valley Historical Review 17, no. 3 (1930): 351-366. Hamer examines the beliefs colonists shared about an alliance between the Cherokee and Britain and the role one individual, John Stewart, played in it. The article finds that Stewart’s role was almost insignificant and that his ‘use’ of the Native American troops was singularly non-aggressive during the first 15 months of the war. This reflected orders from his superiors and generally reflected the reluctance of the British command to use natives against the colonists.

Higginbotham, Don. “The Early American Way of War: Reconnaissance and Appraisal.” The William and Mary Quarterly 44, no. 2 (1987): 230-273. This article asks how Americans viewed militias and regular military forces. It also asks if there is evidence of a distinctly “American way of war” during the revolution. After the article offers evidence that this is indeed the case, it concludes that America already perceived itself as having a winning military tradition (especially against Indian and Catholic nations). He goes on to suggest that the foundations laid by these initial successes

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dictated, or at least influenced, future policies in the 19th century towards Western Indian tribes and Mexico.

Hofstadter, Beatrice K. Review of The Loyalists in Revolutionary America, 1760-1781, by Robert Mccluer Calhoon. The American Historical Review 80, no. 2 (1975): 487-488.The author addresses what she identifies as Robert M. Calhoon’s attempt to synthesize a ‘new’ body of Loyalist scholarship. Hofstadter identifies two central questions in Calhoon’s work. One is that of Loyalist attitudes, and political roles. The other is the question of what happened to the Loyalist after the war. Hofstadter suggests that bias in American historiography obscures the answers to these questions.

Hollis, Daniel Walker. Review of David Ramsay, 1749-1815: Selections from His Writings, ed. Robert L. Brunhouse. The Journal of Southern History 32, no. 2 (1966): 243-244. In his review of these writings, Hollis focuses on the Loyalist Ramsay’s background as a medical doctor in pre-war Charleston. Ramsey’s opinions, assembled from his correspondence, take a very dim view of his fellow colonist. He speaks especially of the ‘savagery’ of the back-country folk, comparing them with the Cherokee. These comments hint at the complex social situation that may have contributed to the nature of the warfare in the Carolina back-country. Hollis comments on the assemblage of social, cultural, and economic materials embodied by this work and believes it very important to the history of South Carolina.

Lee, Wane E. “Early American Ways of War: A New Reconnaissance, 1600-1815.” The Historical Journal 44, no. 1 (2001): 269-289. Lee explores the links between culture and military behavior with a special emphasis on the role Native Americans may have had on the formation of the American military. Lee believes that 18th - and 19th- century students of early American military history looked to the past mainly as precedent for current military policy and that the historiography (as of 2001) continues to be influenced by variations of that question.

Lambert, Robert S. “The Confiscation of Loyalist Property in Georgia, 1782-1786.” The William and Mary Quarterly 20, no. 1 (1963): 80-94.Lambert examines the confiscation of Loyalist property during and after the Revolutionary War in Georgia. The articles focuses on the legal precedents established to seize this property. The author states that this action was more than just a way of punishing “Tories”; the process of Confiscation was also supposed to fund the war and help re-build the state after the war.

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Lambert, Robert Stansbury. South Carolina Loyalists in the American Revolution. Clemson University: Clemson University Digital Press, 2010. Lambert’s book describes the Loyalist experience in South Carolina through the end of the Revolutionary War. Lambert’s exhaustive research has yielded one of the best estimates for the actual number of Loyalists at 1/5 of the population (~20%). Importantly, this work covers the years especially critical to the Loyalist cause in SC, 1780-81. During this time, Britain’s Southern strategy begin to flounder because of the failure of Loyalist support, both in numbers (the British always assumed there were more Loyalists than there were) and because the British, in turn, failed to support the Loyalists once they had declared themselves. Lambert also documents the migration of hundreds of Loyalist families to Canada, Spanish Florida, and the Caribbean after the war.

Lumpkin, Henry. From Savannah to Yorktown: The American Revolution in the South. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1981.Lumpkin provides a detailed narrative of the progression of battles from the Carolina and Georgia backcountry to the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown. The book includes a comprehensive chronology of the war including a large appendix with lists of the opposing forces present at different battles. These battles, especially those that occurred in South Carolina, are extensively covered (Cowpens, for example) and many lesser know battles are described. In his last chapter, Lumpkin concludes that the British could not protect their adherents or control the back country and that the failure to secure the Carolinas and Georgia destroyed their last chance to retake the colonies. Lumpkin’s writing is very much in the vein of ‘old’ military history.

Mason, Keith. Review of Devil of a Whipping: The Battle of Cowpens, by Lawrence E. Babits. and The Cousins' Wars: Religion, Politics, and the Triumph of Anglo-America, by Kevin Phillips. The Journal of American History 86, no. 4 (2000): 1757-1758.Mason summarizes the book’s account of the conditions leading up to the battle and praises the documentation techniques Babits used to establish deployment areas and casualty figures. Babits’ substantiation of actual participant numbers is considered to be very important. Because of the author’s almost exclusive concentration on the battle itself, Mason says that he is not part of the “new military history,” because he leaves key social issues unaddressed.

Morris, Richard B. “Class Struggle and the American Revolution.” The William and Mary Quarterly 19, no. 1 (1962): 3-29. This article looks at the different ways the Revolution has been seen by different classes. It debates the exact nature of the Revolution and its ongoing role in American society. Morris says that a view of the Revolution that is only political cannot adequately explain everything that occurred during the war. He perceives a campaign of social reform intertwined with the struggle for independence, seeking to demonstrate that the Patriots slowly shifted from a purely constitutional view of revolution to one that embrace the ‘natural’ rights of men. In his synopsis of interpretations, Morris reviews interpretations current at the time (Whig, Imperialists, and Populist Schools).

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Nelson, Paul David. “British Conduct of the American Revolutionary War: A Review of Interpretations.” The Journal of American History 65, no. 3 (1978): 623-653. Nelson says that there are two kinds of historians of the American Revolution: those who believe Americans won the war and those who believe the British lost it. Nelson is in the later camp and seeks to demonstrate that political inattention, mediocre actors and poor planning doomed the British effort by 1776. Nelson believes that the old saw regarding overweening pride and arrogance and “absence of mind” where responsible for the loss of the American colonies.

Oliver, Charles M. Critical Companion to Walt Whitman: A Literary Reference to His Life and Work. New York: Infobase Publishing, 2006.This work contains a concise biography of the poet along with his collected works. There is also a section that addresses the ppeople, places, ppublications, and ttopics important to Whitman.

Paine, Thomas. “The Crisis.” Thomas Paine. USHistory.Org, http://www.ushistory.org/paine/ crisis/ singlehtml.htm.Mr. Paine’s writings, in the form of pamphlets and tracks, were of vital importance to the morale of a battered Patriot army. His blanket characterization of Loyalist may have been a smidge unfair.

Pancake, John S. This Destructive War: The British Campaign in the Carolinas, 1780-1782. University, AL: University of Alabama Press, 2003. Pancake focuses on the nature of guerrilla warfare in the Carolina interior and examines why the British loss was a result of attrition rather than grand tactical mistakes. Pancake is of the ‘old’ military history school and does not concern himself with the ‘new’ histories’ examinations of the social or political dimensions of the conflict. Pancake is also a proponent of the ‘Revolutionary war as civil war’ school as it related to the Carolina backwoods. The author uses narrative to tell his story and makes logical and well-reasoned assumptions about details of the conflict. He recognizes both atrocity and heroics on the part of all actors. Pancake makes use of numerous footnotes and includes several maps.

Piecuch, James. Three Peoples, One King: Loyalists, Indians, and Slaves in the Revolutionary South, 1775 – 1782. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2008. This book examines the role Loyalist;Native Americans and slaves played in the Revolution. Piecuch challenges the view that the British lost control of the Southern colonies because of lack of local support. Throughout his book, Piecuch provides a counterpoint to Walter B. Edgar’s assertions of a British terror campaign, demonstrating that the Patriots, too, carried out a violent suppression against Loyalists.

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Pugh, Robert C. “The Revolutionary Militia in the Southern Campaign, 1780-1781.” The William and Mary Quarterly 14, no. 2 (1957): 154-175. Pugh examines how militias have been viewed by historians and defends their central role in the war. Pugh seeks to address then-current misconceptions concerning the militia component of Colonial forces. Militias performed the important role of tying up and draining the resources of Lord Cornwallis’ forces in South Carolina and could be used to good effect when used properly (the Battle of Guildford Courthouse, for example). Pugh argues that many Colonial victories in the Southern campaign would not have been possible without the militia and that it deserves recognition as a “necessary element of final victory.”

Rauch, Steven J. “Southern (Dis)Comfort: British Phase IV Operations in South Carolina and Georgia, May-September 1780.” Army History 71 (2009): 34-50. This article provides a detailed description of the Southern campaign and explores the military and social factors leading to the British defeat in the South Carolina. This article, featuring synthesis and narrative, is an excellent example of a modern historical take on the subject.

Rubin, Benjamin. “The Rhetoric of Revenge: Atrocity and Identity in the Revolutionary Carolinas.” Journal of Backcountry Studies 5, no 2 (2010): 1-46.Rubin discusses the tendency of both Loyalist and Whigs to define each other by the atrocities or war crimes attributed to them. He suggests that both sides quickly began to fight and take revenge against an enemy that primarily existed in their collective imagination and not on the field. One atrocity led to another in a self-fulfilling prophecy of violence. Adding to this cycle was the frequent spread of misinformation circulated, inadvertently or perhaps on purpose, throughout the Carolinas. Casualties were often inflated and real crimes might be misattributed to one group or another.

Shipton, Clifford K. Review of Peter Oliver's Origin & Progress of the American Rebellion: A Tory View, by Peter Oliver. The New England Quarterly 35, no. 1 (1962): 119-120.Shipton believes few documents are more important for the understanding of the Revolutionary era than Oliver’s work. Shipton points out that Oliver, as the Chief Justice of Massachusetts before the war, was particularly well placed to observe some of the most important political activities of the period. He attributes the lack of interest in these documents (up to the time they were published) by historians to Oliver’s keen wit and opinionated reporting. Shipton laments only that the work has a very think index.

Smith, Page. David Ramsay, 1749-1815: Selections from His Writings, ed. Robert L. Brunhouse. The William and Mary Quarterly 17, no. 1 (1960): 51-77.Smith does not so much review Ramsay’s writings as use them as a basis for an essay about the practice of historiography. She maintains that that the best interpretation of the causes of the Revolution was made immediately after the war and that historians since that time

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have developed increasingly distorted views of the countries’ beginnings. Ramsay, who Smith feels did not receive the recognition he was due, remains the best qualified to interpret his time. In other words, those who most closely experienced the Revolutionary war are not only its best narrators but also its best analysts.

Smith, Paul H. Review of “The American Loyalists: Notes on Their Organization andNumerical Strength.” The William and Mary Quarterly 25, no. 2 (1968): 259-277. Written before the current spate of substantive work on the subject, Smith invited scholars to undertake Loyalist studies (while helpfully defining the then current schools of thought on the Revolution), necessary, he maintains, “…in order to resolve outstanding questions about the Revolution as a result of social and economic unrest (Progressive), in deep-seated ideological tensions (Neo-Whig), or in a constitutional dilemma (Whig).” Smith attempted to move past simple population estimates to examine the real strength of the Loyalists. A grave overestimation of Loyalist strength was one of the flaws in the British strategy for the Southern colonies. British estimates exceeded 50%, with tragic results for the Loyalists who did take up the cause. Smith’s conclusion of 16-18% is approximately the same as Lumpkin’s (19-20%).

Tyler, Moses Coit. The Literary History of the American Revolution 1763-1783. New York: The Knickerbocker Press, 1897.The author paints a sympathetic picture of Loyalists. His conclusions were that many Loyalist took the stance they did as a matter of conscience, and not, as was often assumed, out of self-interest (refuting the Whig view). Loyalists were also defined as a people drawn from a wide spectrum of Colonial society and not just wealthy or highly placed groups.

Van Tyne, Claude Halstead. The Loyalist in the American Revolution. London: MacMillan & Co., 1902.Van Tyne addresses the nature of Loyalists in his exploration of literature from the Revolutionary period. His common-sense observations of Loyalist motivations acknowledge the relative merits and weaknesses of individuals within the group, suggesting that honor was as much a motivation as self-interest. His conclusions are remarkably free of overtly Whig or Progressive interpretations.

Vipperman, Carl J. Review of South Carolina Loyalists in the American Revolution, by RobertStansbury Lambert. The William and Mary Quarterly 46, no. 1 (1989): 198-200. Vipperman defines Lambert’s book as one in which the author sets out to discover what proportion of the South Carolina population was Loyalist and to determine their motivations for being so were. Vipperman describes Lambert as a biographer and genealogist both, who uses exhaustive methods research to identify the approximate number and type of Loyalist. Vipperman finds Lambert’s results ‘gratifying.’ Lambert’s research revealed a rich cast of characters with varying motivations for their political

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choice. Many of the most ardent Loyalists were backcountry folk, a substantial portion of whom were recently arrived emigrants of non-English origin whose primary concern was for security for themselves and their families.

U.S. Civil War Centennial Commission, Facts about the Civil War. Washington, D.C. GPO, 1959.