While he didn’t use a rattlesnake, Benjamin Franklin was the guy who came up with the original “Join or Die” snake image [right]back in 1754. (At least most people give him credit for it.)

It was based in a superstition that if you cut up a snake into pieces and then reassembled those pieces before sunset, the snake could be resurrected. In 1754, during the French and Indian War, Delaware was part of Pennsylvania and New England’s four colonies were simply grouped together. Georgia was altogether omitted and nobody knows why.

At any rate, it’s only fitting that when the Gadsden Flag, which we talked about in the December 20th episode, made its debut, Franklin was the one who took the time to opine on why a snake was so appropriate; what’s more why a rattlesnake was the best choice. He published an essay in a local newspaper under a pen name, but his identity was figured out anyway.

The post Ben Franklin Analyzes the Snake–December 27, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Most of us have a pop culture view of the American Revolution period, and some of us go so far as to have some idea of what happened via the 1970 film 1776. Oddly enough, that movie has both a ton of accuracy with its facts (but not necessarily in the right order), and a ton of dramatic license.

One thing the film gets right is that John Adams was a bit of a nudge, constantly pushing the other delegates toward the Indepency movement. He wasn’t considered exactly obnoxious, but maybe a bit zealous. At the same time, his cousin Samuel Adams wasn’t represented at all in the movie. And that’s a shame, because while he was the quieter one overall, he was instrumental in shaping the debate.

As far as historians can tell (and it’s tough, because Congress worked under a secrecy rule–their notes tell you what happened but not necessarily who did what), Samuel Adams acted as a kind of parliamentary whip, schmoozing with delegates and getting them to see his side of things. He was on most of the military committees, and in fact was the man who first proposed that George Washington become the Continental Army’s Commander-in-Chief.

See? It’s not about the beer.

The post Sam Adams Has Thoughts–December 26, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

The Battle of Great Bridge may be over, but its effects linger on.

Lord Dunmore, the former Royal Governor of South Carolina, communicated to General Robert Howe that he’d like to effect a prisoner exchange.

It’s not clear whether Howe was playing hard-to-get, or playing dumb, or something else. He and Dunmore exchanged several letters over the next couple of days, and apparently didn’t end in a prisoner exchange. It did, however, end in violence. We’ll be talking about that as we get into the new year.

The post Confusing–And Howe–December 25, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Mike’s pretty much covered the story of the capture of a British ship in the episode, so I’m going to tell you a little bit about Joseph Warren, who (you may recall) was killed at the battle of Bunker Hill.

Warren became a doctor early in his career, and he also became a Patriot before it was fashionable. He was a powerful speaker, and for several years in a row he would deliver a speech commemorating the anniversary of the Boston Massacre.

In the fall of 1774, he composed the Suffolk Reserves, which urged armed resistance to the British and a boycott of British goods.

So by the time 1775 rolled around, he was one of the most influential men in Massachusetts; in fact he was the president of the Provincial Congress, which by then was the body actually running things there.

In addition, he was on the Safety Committee, ensuring that gunpowder and ammunition was available to militiamen who needed it.

We’ve been talking about the Siege of Boston since April. That was his doing; he’d organized the siege in the first place. George Washington took over a while later. He then organized the building of the earthworks at Bunker Hill before that battle started. And when the British began to overrun the Patriots, he was instrumental in giving them an opportunity to escape. But that’s where his luck ran out: a British soldier recognized him and shot him in the head, killing him instantly.

The Brits then stripped his body and stabbed it several times, then buried him in a shallow grave with another Patriot who’d been killed. Later on, Paul Revere had to identify the body.

The point to all of this is that, had he survived the battle, Joseph Warren would almost certainly have been a much larger figure in the American mythos; maybe he’d even have been our first President instead of Washington.

Ponder that!

The post Merry Christmas, Indeed–December 24, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

As important as some of the action in the southern colonies was—and make no mistake, Colonel Richard Richardson’s campaign to sniff out the Loyalist leaders in the western part of the state wound up being very important—other events were important in different ways.

One such event would be the Snow Campaign. There came a point where Richardson decided that he’d done about as much as he could, so he started to head back to the Low Country, where Charleston is located. On the way back his men, who were ill-prepared for poor weather, ran into snow.

Lots of snow.

Fifteen inches of snow.

Before very long the troop had disbanded and about 130 prisoners had to be escorted to Charleston, after which a few were set free as a conciliatory move.

So no, not everything took place during the snow; in fact the snow was really the very ending of the Snow Campaign.

The post The Snow Campaign–December 23, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

The Battle of Great Cane Brake took place near modern-day Simpsonville, South Carolina. That’s a few miles southeast of Greenville.

A “Brake of Canes” is pretty much what it sounds like. The cane stalks in question are a kind of bamboo that grows in the area, and a “Cane Brake” is a large thicket of these stalks. It would probably be a good place to hide, if the Loyalists weren’t also cutting and burning the stalks to keep warm, and because they were wet, they were popping quite loudly. It’s like sending up an audio flare.

While the Battle of Great Cane Brake was a victory for the Patriots, before very long the weather would turn it into a bigger problem for the troops involved.

The post The Battle of Great Cane Brake–December 22, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

General Richard Richardson was a delegate to the Provincial Congresses in South Carolina in 1775 and 1776, and he served in both the South Carolina Militia and the Continental Army during the Revolution. He was instrumental in the Americans winning the Battle of Charleston in 1776, but doesn’t get much else attention, perhaps because he was captured a few years later and then sent home, essentially to die.

But the fact that he spent time driving Loyalists out of the western areas of South Carolina led directly to that province getting on board with the Independence movement more quickly. He also left behind a legacy of descendants who would affect the state well into the twentieth century.

Incidentally, I have no idea if there’s any truth to the rumor that Richard Richardson was so poor as a child that he couldn’t afford a different last name. Largely because I made that rumor up just now.

The post One Thing Ends, Another One Begins–December 21, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

It’s arguably the most recognizable and popular symbol of the Revolutionary Era, and its debut turns 250 years old today. Ladies and Gentlemen, it’s the Gadsden Flag.

The concept of the snake image representing the Colonies is a little older than this by about twenty years, with the “JOIN OR DIE” image of the snake broken into nine pieces, each representing some portion of the colonies. In either case it’s a means of using a uniquely American species of snake to represent the Colonies.

Not only did Christopher Gadsden design the flag, he did it on his own, without anyone prompting him to do it. While the Join or Die snake was probably a little more generic, Gadsden specifically chose a rattlesnake largely because he was from South Carolina, and the rattlesnakes in the Charleston area had the good grace to warn you before taking a bite out of you. To that end, the rattlesnake was considered an honorable, “glorious” creature.

The post The Gadsden Flag Debuts–December 20, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

The Great Chesapeake Bay, which is protected by the Delmarva Peninsula (DELaware, MARyland, VirginiA, get it?) is a watershed area that is hugely important for these three states, plus New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey.

Because of its importance, there are sensor buoys all over the place, measuring water temperature, salinity levels, turbidity (how clear the water is), air pressure and maybe a dozen other factors. They’re connected to NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration), and you can actually get the data for your own research here. I’ve actually used it in the classroom to demonstrate how bad weather can affect things like salinity, or how fertilizer-laden water runoff from farms can lead to algae blooms.

It’s been called “Chesapeake” for so long that historians and etymologists aren’t quite sure where it derives from. It could be a corruption of the Algonquin word Chesepiooc; it could refer to the Chesepian people a tribe from the modern-day Hampton Roads area of Virginia. According to Wikipedia it’s the seventh-oldest place name in the US, but they weren’t telling what #1 through #6 are.

It’s also—especially in the 18th Century—rather hard to defend. And while the Continental Congress dragged its feet a little bit to get the Navy raised, the more-nimble Virginia Convention commissioned a few ships of their own. Their first was a ship aptly named the Patriot.

The post Protecting the Chesapeake–December 19, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.

Military Intelligence is a peculiar thing, if only because you never know where it’s going to come from, and/or what it’s going to affect.

And that’s where today’s episode comes in, because Congress received a letter written today which detailed some plans for British military activity in Virginia. What’s surprising is that the intelligence came from…George Washington, in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Washington was the lucky recipient of food that had been intercepted on its way to the British folks under siege in Boston. He also received several documents outlining plans that were afoot in Virginia, and he dutifully passed them along.

Most of it was related to Great Bridge, which had already seen some action, but it still put Congress wise to the fact that the war wasn’t only taking place in the northeast, and that military intelligence can come from anywhere.

The post Washington Has Some Intel–December 18, 1775 appeared first on 250 and Counting.