LAD # 4: Rethinking the Revolution

When comparing the Civil War to the Revolutionary War I learned a few things about the Revolutionary War.

1. History is skewed and not completely true depending on who tells it and how they want it to be told. After the Revolution in the early 1800s some Bostonians tried to not play up the role of the working class people of Boston and their participation in great revolts and protests, like those because of the Stamp Act.

2. When the article was written in 2007 the Revolutionary War was recognized as America's longest war, lasting longer than 8 years. There were also massive numbers of casualties. The most accurate numbers were estimated to have lost 30,000 in a population of 2.5 million. This may not seem like a lot, but compared to the growing populations during later wars, the Revolutionary War was even more deadly than the Civil War; compare 1:4 dying in the Revolution to 1:5 dying in the Civil war.

3. If one thinks about it, comparing it to any other war, especially the civil war, it is difficult to think of a revolutionary solider. You have Washington, Arnold and Jones. Compare that to Stonewall Jackson, Robert E. Lee, Grant, and Sherman. Many people can name people who had a great deal to do with the revolution, but were never military; Jefferson, Adams, Henry and Hancock to name a few. But the real soldiers names were kind of lost in history and not as well remembered.

4. History is also shaped by art, such as the inaccurate paintings of the revolution. None show any true battles, though the theme of each is war. Each painting makes the revolution seemingly glamorous. The artists leave out the dead bodies littering the field and the manual labor of shooting a time period gun among others Comparing these paintings to the pictures of the Civil War, it makes the Revolutionary War seem relatively small and calm.

5. Historians accounts do not help bring the true goriness of the war to light. This is because they focus on the two large meetings for the decision of independence and the Constitutional Convention which occurs after the war is over. By skipping some of the battles and not talking in as much detail it makes it seem like the war itself may have been more trivial than it actually was.