250 and Counting

Well…it’s official. It was on this day in 1775 that our assorted collection of irregular militiamen turned into a genuine army. The Provincial Congress in Massachusetts proposed, and adopted, a resolution that provided for a genuine army dedicated to protecting our shores against the British. That was the New England Army, but the name didn’t last long. Tune in to find out their other name. The post April 8, 1775: The New England Army appeared first on 250 and Counting.

It’s cake and candles today for Francis Cabot Lowell, a manufacturer who helped modernize the textile industry in the United States, largely through industrial espionage: in the middle of a trade war with Europe, Lowell visited England and memorized the processes they were using so that he could bring them back to this side of the pond, helping us to break the hold on imported goods from Europe by innovating the cradle-to-grave manufacturing process for fabrics. Yet, despite his prominence in the industry, and despite the statue that stands in his name in the town of Lowell, Massachusetts, the silhouette seen in today’s cover art is the only hint that we have regarding what he might have looked like. There are no portraits extant that we know of. The post April 7, 1775: Francis Cabot Lowell appeared first on 250 and Counting.

In past episodes (quite recently, in fact) we’ve talked about the Colonists’ need to move caches of gunpowder and other weaponry when they got wind of an imminent British seizure. By the time April of 1775 rolled around, it wasn’t just the explosive weapons that the British were after; it was the press as well. And the more you hear about the specific things that the British imposed on the Colonies as events moved closer to all-out war, the more obvious their need to appear in the Bill of Rights becomes. (Whatever you think of any specific Amendment, it’s not too tough to see the reasoning that went into its inclusion if you look at it from a contemporary standpoint rather than a modern-day one.) This it was that on this day, the Colonists heard that the British were going to move in on restricting a free press, so the Massachusetts Spy simply up and left so there would be nothing to seize. The post April 6, 1775: Stop the Presses! appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Up until now, we’ve presented General Thomas Gage as rather a hard liner who was looking to subjugate the Colonies somehow. Nothing could be further from the truth. The fact is, he like being a light-hearted guy, and when he became the Royal Governor of Massachusetts, he discovered exactly what kind of mess he’d stepped into. At that point, anything he did would only make matters worse. The post April 5, 1775: The British Gear Up For War appeared first on 250 and Counting.

The title kind of buries the bigger story, but we wanted to ensure that you understood what a big deal Elizabeth Gooking Greenleaf was. Elizabeth was dead by the time 1775 rolled around, but her family continued to run the apothecary shop for many years, and they were instrumental in ensuring that the Massachusetts Patriots were equipped with medical supplies should war break out. Today there is a chain of pharmacies in the midwest called GreenLeaf Apothecary, but there’s no connection we could find between this and the original, except perhaps as homage. The post April 4, 1775: America’s First Female Pharmacist appeared first on 250 and Counting.

In the play and film 1776, one of the delegates from New York says that in the state legislature, everybody talks very loud and very fast and never seems to get anywhere. This may or may not be true, but the fact is, they did have some specific instructions for their delegates to the Second Continental Congress. One of them was that New York would be expected to oppose independence for as long as possible. That was probably because they were looking at Vermont as a model and preparing to declare themselves an independent nation. Claude is originally from New York, and he’s of the opinion that most New Yorkers still think of themselves as members of a separate nation. But that’s a different debate. The post April 3, 1775: The New York General Assembly Hangs It Up appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Calvin Jones may have looked like an unassuming fellow, but that unassuming look concealed a very powerful mind and a strong moral compass. And today we’ve got Cake and Candles for him, since this day in 1775 was the date of his birth. Jones was a physician before his teenage years ended, and he began to design criteria that would separate good doctors from bad ones. He organized militias even though he was under no orders to do so. And then when the War of 1812 broke out, he became a major general with a reputation for excellence, to the point where nobody really worried about whether North Carolina would fall to the British. After the war he basically helped shepherd the development of a brand-new field of medicine, and after his death, much of his land became Wake Forest University. What’s more, it was because of Jones that the school has a head-scratcher of a name rather than an incomprehensible one. The post April 2, 1775: Calvin Jones–Physician, Soldier, Benefactor appeared first on 250 and Counting.

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: Thomas Gage was kind of a weird bird. In our cover art he’s defending children who were using Boston Common for sledding and skating. This was just a couple of months before today’s events. But other times, he was a little on the lazy side, often looking for clues that aren’t there, and letting other peoples’ opinions get the better of him. It’s entirely possible that the best idea Gage ever had was whatever he’d been told most recently. His decisions appear on their surface to be expressions of concern for the Colonists. Do with that what you will. The post April 1, 1775: Thomas Gage is Steps Behind appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Today’s episode marks the end of Women’s History Month. We’ve noted a few episodes since this adventure first started that involved women taking political action as groups, but Mercy Otis Warren was one of the most influential individual women to take a political stand in the Revolution era. She was self-educated, and married a man who was both enlightened and politically active himself, and she used her position as her husband’s hostess to develop and maintain connections of her own. She was also able to use what she learned to develop some of the pieces she wrote, whether they were factual or thinly-disguised fiction pieces. Claude and his wife Shannon did the extra-touristy thing of visiting Plymouth, Massachusetts during Thanksgiving weekend several years ago, and we did see the Mercy Otis Warren statue, but frankly at that time we still had a lot to learn about her. (If you go, be warned that Plymouth Rock is even more disappointing than everyone tells you it is.) And because it’s an episode celebrating Mercy Warren, we talked Shannon into recording the episode. Enjoy. The post March 31, 1775: Mercy Otis Warren, Ignoring the Rules appeared first on 250 and Counting.

In the past we’ve talked about the New England Restraining Act; today was the day that King George III actually put it into action. To mark that day, Mike takes you through some of the details of the act and its impact on the trade in the Colonies, and the political impact in Britain. The post March 30, 1775: King George III Restricts Trade appeared first on 250 and Counting.

There are plenty of scholarly books and articles out there regarding American History, but there are elements of British history that stick out, too. General Gage giving the order today that his troops begin to march on Roxbury. It was a relatively small gesture at the time, but many, many colonial events can be traced to that particular action. And as a result the Colonists determined that Britain can’t move numbers of men like that again without bumping into a few flintlocks along the way. The post March 29, 1775: The Brits Head to Roxbury appeared first on 250 and Counting.

One of the interesting things about many of the British officials who were around during the early days of the American Revolution is that most of them were actually pretty good at their job. It’s just that they were given rather thankless tasks to do which wound up backfiring on them. And then there’s John Murray, the Fourth Earl of Dunmore. History has not been especially kind to Lord Dunmore, not should it be. He often acted rashly and without consulting some of the people he should have consulted, and in the end he wound up getting a lot of people very angry, instead of getting a few people a little annoyed. Lord North, over in London, is often defined as the Prime Minister who lost the Colonies, but Dunmore clearly did his part to ensure that they stayed lost regardless of the outcome. And today in history, Lord Dunmore issued a proclamation against electing delegates to the Second Continental Congress, but the Second Virginia Convention, by now in its last day or so, ignored him and sent people anyway. (They’d already elected a couple, so Dunmore’s proclamation was a little bit of closing the barn after the horse had escaped.) The post March 28, 1775: Lord Dunmore Makes Noise appeared first on 250 and Counting.

We hate to say it, but Thomas Jefferson was kind of a nepo baby. Jefferson was part of the Second Virginia Convention, and no doubt he got there honestly, as a man who had lots of property and was well-regarded, even at the tender age of 32. But when Peyton Randolph needed someone to replace him in the Second Continental Congress, he called on Jefferson—who was his cousin. On the positive side, Jefferson acquitted himself well in both the Virginia House of Burgesses, where he represented Albemarle County, and simultaneously at the Second Continental Congress. So while he probably didn’t need the familial boost, it surely didn’t hurt. The post March 27, 1775: Thomas Jefferson Gets an Important Appointment appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Never let it be said that we can’t find the less-obvious folks in American History. Thomas Bayly was definitely one of them. Bayly was a one-term congressman to the US House of Representatives as part of the 13th Congress (as this is written, we’re in the 118th). By most accounts he wasn’t especially distinguished, but only serving for the one term didn’t mean that he was politically finished. A few years after he left Congress, he was elected to the Virginia House of Delegates, and he was part of the Virginia Constitutional Convention. Bayly was “minor” enough in history that we were only able to find a single image of him—the one in the cover artwork. And it’s actually a black-and-white rendering of a color painting that’s been zoomed in to the point where you can see the texture on the canvas. It’s a detail from a painting of the entire House of Delegates around 1820. The post March 26, 1775: Thomas Monteagle Bayly appeared first on 250 and Counting.

George Washington was a frequent letter writer, something that the creators of the stage play 1776 would poke some fun at. But the documentation he kept plays an important part not only in the history of the American Revolution, but in the more mundane details of life during that time in American History. What’s more, we’re fortunate that so much of the correspondence both to and from Washington remains extant to this day. (Not all of it, as you’ll hear today, but it appears that most of it does.) Today we present two letters: one written from the Second Virginia Convention from George to his brother, and another written to George the same day by a merchant he frequently dealt with. The merchant died not long after writing the letter, so it’s not known whether Washington received it before the merchant died. What we do know is that the death resulted in an unexpected expense for Washington. The post March 25, 1775: Letters to and From George appeared first on 250 and Counting.

We’ve spent a lot of time talking about events in Virginia lately, but that doesn’t mean that the folks in Massachusetts weren’t getting things done. It just means that they weren’t making a big deal about it. For the past several weeks, they’d been working on the down-low to make plans in case the British took any action that they might find too intrusive, from simple confiscations to an all-out shooting offense. (Of course that was still on the table; nobody had forgotten the Boston Massacre.) It wasn’t until this day in history that they made their resolution publicly known. And in the wake of Patrick Henry’s very recent proclamation, nobody would be surprised if things escalated sooner rather than later. The post March 24, 1775: The Massachusetts Provincial Congress Steps Up appeared first on 250 and Counting.

This show isn’t just about the big moments in American history, though we’ve been giving you those. We also take the time to look at some of the smaller things, which may have an effect later on down the line. And today we can mark two of those events. First up is a wedding taking place in Southampton County in Virginia, across the bay from Williamsburg. The bride was an educated woman who carried on that tradition afterward, and the groom was a future mayor of Richmond, the city’s first, in fact. Meanwhile, up in Pennsylvania, America’s first botanist was celebrating a birthday. Unfortunately it was one of his last. The post March 23, 1775: A Wedding Announcement and a Birthday Celebration appeared first on 250 and Counting.

A quick note on the cover art: this may be the first time I (Claude) happened to match the side banner with the background of the webpage exactly. As we’ve noted in the past, Benjamin Franklin and Edmund Burke were good friends who worked together to come up with a solution that would get the Colonies and the Crown back into each others’ good graces. Now that we think about it, Franklin was good friends with many people on both sides of the Atlantic, and now we’re wondering if he was just one of those guys to whom you take an instant liking without knowing quite why. At any rate, by this point the two men had to concede that it was far too late to prevent further escalation, and they were right. Burke took the time to address Parliament on this day, and let them all know just what a mistake they’d made. The post March 22, 1775: Edmund Burke Gives Parliament His Thoughts appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Benjamin Franklin was pretty good at diplomacy, but even when given several years to try, he was unable to bring about peace between England and the Thirteen Colonies. From December 1774 through February 1775, he and some of his British friends tried to put together a map to peace, but unfortunately both sides were too entrenched to even consider compromise. Franklin finally went home on this day in 1775, but he left one final impression that we’ll learn about tomorrow. The post March 21, 1775: Franklin Departs London Forever appeared first on 250 and Counting.

The people in Virginia were getting pretty upset about what was going on between the Colonies and the British Parliament. They called a convention and, as we’ve noted over the past several days, each county sent delegates with specific instructions, many of which recommended that the colony commit itself to resisting the British and supporting any efforts made by other American entities in that respect. The Second Virginia Convention finally met on this day in 1775, and they elected Peyton Randolph as its president. This was no surprise to anyone, as Randolph had been the president of the First Virginia Convention, and of the First Continental Congress. Randolph was also briefly the president of the Second Continental Congress but had to return to Virginia and was replaced by John Hancock. Shortly thereafter he had a fit of apoplexy (what we now call a hemorrhagic stroke) and died in October 1775. So even though he didn’t live to learn of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Randolph is frequently considered to be one of our Founding Fathers. The post March 20, 1775: The Second Virginia Convention appeared first on 250 and Counting.

The Watauga Purchase was one of several land purchases in the area of the Watauga River made around the same time. But this one was first, and we know this because it’s literally on Page One of the deed book, which still exists in the Archives of two different states (one is a copy, of course). Interestingly, while this territory is sometimes considered by historians to be a self-governing area, the residents actually considered themselves to be British subjects, even after the war began, and to a certain extent even for a short period after the Declaration of Independence was signed. That likely ended when the Cherokees (who were aligned with the British) attacked several settlements, although they were badly beaten in the attempt. The post March 19, 1775: The Watauga Purchase appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Among the casualties of the early days of American History are all the friendships that were damaged by people being on opposite sides of the political fence. Good thing we’re all past that sort of petty nonsense nowadays, amirite? Sigh. We’ve talked in the past about John Adams and his former friend Daniel Leonard, who sparred in print under pen names and never quite repaired their relationship. Today we talk about Benjamin Franklin and Edmund Burke, a member of the British Parliament who was good friends with Franklin, though perhaps not publicly. Today marks the likely last day that the two men ever saw each other, as Franklin was on the final trip to England of his lifetime. Sadder still, Burke was actually sympathetic to the Colonist cause, though he wasn’t entirely convinced that they’d win a war. On the other hand, hardly anyone was convinced that Britain would be defeated, so there’s that. The post March 18, 1775: Ben Franklin Confides in Edmund Burke appeared first on 250 and Counting.

(Yeah, we couldn’t fit all that on the title card and have the artwork still visible.) Happy St. Patrick’s Day, if you’re the type to celebrate! We have a little Easter Egg (shamrock?) in this episode for you. Ninian Edwards was an interesting character in that he tried very hard to make the best choices for the people he represented, and while he succeeded in some respects, in others it seems he left a trail of hard feelings and broken plans. But with a single exception he doesn’t seem to have acted out of malice, or greed. It’s just that most of the things he’s known for didn’t quite work out the way he hoped. And yet, he still remains in the record book for a job he held in his youth, and for being one of Illinois’ first senators. The post March 17, 1775: Ninian Edwards and His Illinois Doings appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Over the last few days we’ve heard from several counties in Virginia sending delegates and instructions to the Second Virginia Convention, which would meet in another few days. Many of these counties published their instructions, called “Resolves,” in newspapers, so that anyone who was literate would know where the freeholders of those counties stood. And today it’s Augusta County which weighed in by publishing their Resolves in the Virginia Gazette. Augusta County is quite close to both Fincastle and Botetourt counties, at what is now the western edge of the state. And we have to think that it’s meaningful that these communities, which were relatively far from where anything meaningful was taking place, was taking notice of those events and acting proactively, when only a few weeks earlier they would have been indifferent to it, because after all, it didn’t really affect them. Not yet, anyway. The post March 16, 1775: The Augusta Resolves appeared first on 250 and Counting.

The New York colony gets a bad reputation for not having its act together when it came to American Independence, but the fact is, they were late to the party because they held on to their loyalty to the Crown until there was clearly no more reason to do so. Simply put, they were the last holdout. What makes this extra remarkable is that most of the residents of New York really had no reason to be loyal to King George III, since they weren’t English-born, nor were they the descendants of Englishmen. Instead, most of them were descended from Dutch settlers from over a hundred years earlier. But eventually they did come around, and when they did they showed an ability to snap into action quickly. The post March 15, 1775: New York Calls for Delegates appeared first on 250 and Counting.

John Murray, the Fourth Earl of Dunmore, or more commonly Lord Dunmore, came to the Colonies in 1770 to become the Royal Governor of New York, but fate intervened and he wound up as the Royal Governor of Virginia instead. He might have fared better in New York, but given the events of the Westminster Massacre you learned about yesterday, we’re not sure it would have made much difference. Dunmore wasn’t an especially good politician in general, and he didn’t hold the Colonists in an especially high esteem. And that’s the sort of thing that A) isn’t easily concealed, and B) doesn’t always go over well with your constituents. Not always. The post March 14, 1775: Lord Dunmore Calls for Help appeared first on 250 and Counting.

The Westminster Massacre was a seminal event in the history of both the United States and the State of Vermont. At that time, Vermont was a disputed territory between New York, which was loaded with Loyalists, and New Hampshire, which had many Patriots. So when a group of five dozen New Yorkers showed up to break up a New Hampshire rally, there clearly wasn’t going to be a happy ending to the encounter. But afterward, many New Yorkers were ejected from the area and nearly two years later, Vermont declared its independence from everybody, calling itself its own country rather than a British colony or an American state. It was a condition that lasted until 1791. The post March 13, 1775: The Westminster Massacre appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Henry Eckford was born in Scotland on this day in 1775 and died in Constantinople in 1832. In between he spent a great deal of time in the Thirteen Colonies and then the United States, primarily in New York. Eckford also dabbled in politics, serving in the state legislature and as a delegate to the Electoral College, before moving to the Ottoman Empire to assist with rebuilding the fleet there. He died quite suddenly there, probably of cholera, and his body was brought back to America, where he was buried in the graveyard at St. George’s Episcopal Church in Hempstead, L.I., along with his wife. Coincidentally, many years ago I attended a wedding in that church. The weird bumps you make with history when you live on the East Coast, I tell you what. (At right: Eckford’s grave; picture via findagrave.com) The post March 12, 1775: Henry Eckford, Shipbuilder appeared first on 250 and Counting.

The Botetourt Resolutions was a document prepared by the freeholders of Botetourt County in Virginia that sent instructions to its representatives in the Second Virginia Convention. Botetourt doesn’t get a lot of attention nowadays, largely because the Fincastle Resolutions arrived first and laid down nearly identical sentiments. But as we’ll see in the next few days, these two counties weren’t the only ones with the sort of opinions that they expressed. The post March 11, 1775: The Botetourt Resolutions appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Because of popular culture in the 1950s and 1960s, Daniel Boone is probably one of the more colorful figures in American history. He was born in Pennsylvania, but it was in the frontier territory. He had little formal education, but he could read and write, even if his spelling was unorthodox. (In fact, oftentimes when he went on hunting or exploring expeditions, he was the only literate man in the group.) He was court-martialed at one point, but found Not Guilty and received a promotion afterwards. He was a businessman, a politician, and an explorer, and it’s this last one that we’re going to look at today in 1775. The post March 10, 2025: Daniel Boone Paves the Way for Kentucky appeared first on 250 and Counting.

We’ve talked about the New England Restraining Acts in the past, but now they’re being put to actual votes by Parliament. And on this day in 1775, they take another step forward when the House of Commons passes the measure. With still more economic pressure placed on the Colonies (and the Act itself, by the way, not yet in full force), is it any wonder that the tensions escalated into actual war? The post March 9, 1775: The Restraining Act Moves Forward appeared first on 250 and Counting.

It was on this day that an essay appeared in the Pennsylvania Journal advocating for the abolition of slavery. The content wasn’t a huge surprise for Pennsylvania, but the interesting thing is: the essay is known for being written under a pen name, and for a long time, people were pretty sure they knew who that person was. They’re still not 100% positive. The post March 8, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

[NOTE: our apologies for those who came early and got the wrong file. We hope at least that you enjoyed the re-run. The correct file is now in place. –CC] Topsfield, Massachusetts wanted to be prepared when the British came. What’s more, they wanted to ensure that their militiamen were drilled and fully outfitted should the need arise. To that end, they offered some of the best wages for their Minutemen. But they had some trouble recruiting at first, until the town’s selectmen decided that their initial force wasn’t nearly formidable enough. The post March 7, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Prince Hall, who appears in today’s artwork in an undated and unattributed picture, became interested in becoming a Mason but was turned down because of his race. The British Masons, however, were perfectly willing to accept Blacks into their ranks…so long as they fought on the British side of the Revolution. It wasn’t long before the Americans caught on to the scheme and reversed their decision. But Hall wasn’t done with simply joining the Freemasons. He had additional ambitions for himself, and others who looked like him. The post March 6, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Joseph Warren’s life as a Patriot was rather brief (in fact his life overall was relatively short), but it was quite important to the cause. Warren was part of the committee that investigated the Boston Massacre, he sent Paul Revere on his midnight ride (just go with it for now), he wrote a song called “Free America,” which was based on a British melody called “The British Grenadiers”, he fought at Lexington and Concord, and he died at Bunker Hill. And he was one of only two men who was asked to speak more than once on the anniversary of the Boston Massacre. And this second time was the one that really sold the crowd. The post March 5, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

The Powell Family was a prominent one in the Loudoun County, Virginia area. It’s about due west of Washington, DC. If you’ve ever been anywhere between Leesburg and the Appalachian Mountains in Virginia, you’ve been to Loudoun County. The Powells were among the first to fight for Virginia during the American Revolution, and as the Thirteen Colonies broke away and became the United States, they found themselves with a sense of noblesse oblige and took to representing their area in the political arena. Today we celebrate one of that family, a man born on this day in 1775. The post March 4, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

The Gunpowder Incident was an event that took place on April 21, 1775, so there won’t be much about it today. But that was the event that pushed Virginia deeply into the movement toward independence, and allowed the Continental Congress to finally consider seriously the idea of formally breaking away from England. But it was an event that took place on this day— that barely got any notice at the time—which ultimately led to the Gunpowder Incident. The post March 3, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

As we noted yesterday, there were all kinds of abuses of tea going on in the Colonies. It (mostly) started with the Boston Tea Party, but also spread to other areas as well. The Boston Tea Party was notable for being a literal destruction of unsold tea, removing it from the market. Other tea parties and actions largely involved tea that had already been purchased in the Colonies, either in the form of boycotts (as in the Edenton Tea Party), or in the form of destroying tea from one’s own pantry as a form of protest, as was the case in today’s episode. As noted during yesterday’s show, the Thirteen Colonies didn’t have enough economic clout to make a meaningful impact; they were meant to be symbolic in nature. But the British took these things seriously enough that their actions demonstrated they were looking for a fight rather than trying to avoid it. The post March 2, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

When it comes to tea-related protests, the Boston Tea Party seems to get all the press, even though there was also wanton destruction of tea in Charleston, and then there was the Edenton Tea Party. But Boston was the first, and abusing tea in one way or another became a popular way to demonstrate your patriotism. (Some modern-day Brits would argue that we never quite stopped abusing tea.) Today we talk about an effort to actually prohibit the import or consumption of tea in the Colonies. It worked about as well as you’d expect. The post March 1, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Today we meet yet another prominent citizen who thought he had the solution for putting an end to the tension between the Thirteen Colonies and Great Britain. It’s important to note at this point, we think, that these people weren’t delusional; they were genuinely interested in maintaining a good relationship and therefore invested in repairing the damage that had been done. They liked being British citizens, even though a minority percentage of them had emigrated from England (many were born here; others came from different nations). And it’s also worth noting that when it came to separating from the British Empire…well, that sort of thing had never been done before. Never. So creating an entirely new nation was practically inconceivable for some people. Unfortunately in the end, while Joseph Galloway’s plan was seriously considered by the Continental Congress, it was turned down, and there was an unfortunate series of events that forced him to leave America forever. The post February 28, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

And once again, we have someone (two someones, really) who manage to come up with a plan that will put all this unpleasantness between the Thirteen Colonies and the British Empire to rest, and once again the physical distance between the two threatens the success of those plans. What’s more, it turns out that the more popular of the two plans has an almost-hidden ulterior motive… The post February 27, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

It’s one thing to hear someone hollering “The British are coming!” and quite another to actually see them arriving in your port. And that’s especially true when they’re also seen confiscating the cannons that you’d hidden upriver. This wasn’t the first time something like this had happened, but there was something different about the Colonists’ response—and it almost touched off the war nearly two months before it actually did. The post February 26, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Today we review two different pieces of correspondence—one local, the other trans-Atlantic—in which the letter writers are clearly coming to the conclusion that things are not going well between the British and the Colonies, and that preparing for war is probably inevitable at this point. And that’s interesting on its own, but we also wanted to call your attention to the cover art for today’s episode. The person in the picture is Josiah Quincy II, who is discussed in the episode as a “side” character of sorts. The painting is by Gilbert Stuart, who is pretty famous for painting hundreds of American politicians and public figures, and perhaps most famous for the “unfinished” portrait of George Washington that served as the model for the one-dollar bill. There aren’t a lot of portraits of Quincy extant, but this one (which was painted after Quincy’s death in April 1775) gets a lot of attention from Stuart scholars because it provides a very candid representation of Quincy’s strabismus, or misalignment of the eyes. (It’s possible that he simply had amblyopia but we don’t know for sure nowadays.) Most people agree that it actually gives Quincy a little extra dignity and esteem. The post February 25, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

The interesting thing about surveillance in the 18th century is that, when you’re dealing with trans-Atlantic distances, the information moves slowly, and errors can be costly. We told you not long ago about someone who’d heard about the Minutemen, but had their numbers wrong by a factor of thousands. Fortunately in that case, it was just casual gossip rather than actual spycraft. But today in history, a bit of information about Colonial artillery that was reported to the Provincial Congress in Massachusetts leaked to the British, along with information about the Minutemen’s numbers and level of preparedness. But as we’ll discover in the next couple of days, the British were already taking precautions. The post February 24, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Alexander Hamilton isn’t really considered one of the Founding Fathers, largely because he’d only arrived in America from Scotland around the same time that things started getting ugly between the Colonies and the Crown. But he quickly took up the cause, and it’s clear from his writing that he was of a similar mind as Jefferson, Franklin and the rest. When he joined the Continental Army, he rose quickly through the ranks, becoming Washington’s staff aide and entered politics shortly after the war ended. So while he wasn’t on hand for the initial segment of American statesmanship, he was there when the basic framework of our government was laid down. But back to his writing: he and the Reverend Samuel Seabury (we first heard from him on January 4) got into the habit of debating each other through pamphlets, written under pen names. They’re quite well-written and easy to understand, and because they’re only pamphlets, they don’t run especially long. They’re worth checking out. The post February 23, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Back when Mike and Claude were kids, February 22 was celebrated as a national holiday, the 22nd being recognized as George Washington’s birthday. Lincoln’s Birthday was February 12, so we had two Federal holidays close together. (To be fair, Lincoln’s was always unofficially recognized.) Until, that is, 1968, when the Uniform Monday Holiday Act came along, and many holidays were moved to the Monday of that week. Not every state complied right away, but eventually Lincoln’s Birthday disappeared and Washington’s Birthday moved from the malleable February 22nd to the always-on-Monday Presidents Day. But here’s the part they don’t always tell you: George Washington wasn’t born on February 22. He was actually born on February 11, 1731 but that was under the old Julian calendar. In 1752, Britain and all its colonies switched to the Gregorian Calendar, which changed Washington’s birthday (well, everyone’s, really) by a year and 11 days, to February 22, 1732. Believe it or not, people did not take the calendar change well. Because it was essentially a Catholic innovation (named after Pope Gregory XIII), Protestants thought it was a Catholic plot to return them to the fold. Other people, especially in the Colonies, thought that time was being stolen from their lives, and they demanded that the “lost” days be returned. It wasn’t until public figures—including George Washington—adopted the new dates and made a big deal about doing so, that people started to calm down. None of this is relevant to the story you’ll hear in today’s episode, but this whole Washington’s Birthday thing doesn’t get told nearly enough. In the meantime, enjoy Mike’s story of William Seymour. The post February 22, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Of all the indignities we laid upon Claudius Herrick in this episode (okay, there weren’t that many), the worst is that we misspelled his name in the cover art. The post February 21, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Until Israel Gregg came along, steamboat commerce on the Ohio river was considered impractical, largely because the currents were so strong. But Gregg had an interesting approach to demonstrate that it was, in fact, possible. In some portions of the river, there was a confluence with another river, which meant that there were multiple currents in the river for some distance. This is what made it hazardous in the first place. Gregg made a point of seeking out the currents of a specific river in each confluence, and navigating only that river’s current. So from Brownsville to Pittsburgh, Gregg used the currents of the Monongahela River. From Pittsburgh to Cincinnati, he used the currents of the Ohio River. Then he remained with the current of the Ohio to Louisville. From there he returned to Pittsburgh, running against the current of the Ohio. A few cycles of this had people convinced, and his ship, the Enterprise, became one of the first of that name to go down in history. (Specifically, it was the third in American history.) The post February 20, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

When I (Claude) was younger, I read a Star Trek novel titled The Final Reflection by John M. Ford. Trek novels weren’t considered canon, and later events in the films and subsequent series kind of wiped out some of the concepts put forth in the book, but what I found fascinating was that it was told entirely from the Klingons’ point of view. (It also provided an interesting explanation regarding why Federation transporters give off a high-pitched whine.) Before you think I’ve digressed before I’ve even started, my point here is that today’s episode focuses on a British military figure rather than one of the Founding Fathers or other Colonial figure. We’re taking an all-too-brief look at Lord Horatio Nelson, who did have an important life event take place on this day in 1775. Also, when you listen to the episode, you’ll see I just have Star Trek on my mind. The post February 19, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Maryland has a peculiar place in most of America’s major events. During the Revolution, the Continental Congress hid out there for a while. During the Civil War, the state mostly sat out the war because it was a “Southern” state occupied by the Union throughout. But the War of 1812? Well, that was Maryland’s time to shine, and today we meet one of the military men who fought in that war, though he wasn’t especially successful in the Battle of Bladensburg. We did have a portrait of Winder we were going to use in the cover art until we realized that Winder is buried in Greenmount Cemetery, in Baltimore, a short distance from Claude’s home. So he ran out and snapped a photo. Several famous historic figures are buried there, including John Wilkes Booth (it’s probably the best-known unmarked grave in America), so there may have to be a few more trips over there. The post February 18, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.