American Revolution

Anne Ammundsen laments the lack of public access to a revelatory account of a young English officer who crossed swords – and words – with George Washington.

A distant monarch, political factionalism, vainglorious commanders and the distraction of European enemies helped George Washington seal victory in the American War of Independence, writes Kenneth Baker, who explores the conflict through caricature and print.

Thomas Paine, who died 200 years ago, inspired and witnessed the revolutions that gave birth to the United States and destroyed the French monarchy. A genuinely global figure, he anticipated modern ideas on human rights, atheism and rationalism. David Nash looks at his enduring impact.

Is the US President as a republican substitute for royalty? Frank Prochaska explores the relationship between George III and the Founding Fathers, and the constitutional and ceremonial continuities between Britain and America. 

Was Alexander Hamilton born in 1755 or 1757? He himself was confused about the year of his birth, but January 11th 1755 is currently considered the most likely date.

John Spiller shows that, in constitution-making in the USA (1787-89), France (1789-92) and Great Britain (1830-32), some men were considered more equal than others.

Robert Hole shows how important historical context is for an understanding of the most important document in American history.

Stuart Andrews considers the life and radical milieu of the dissenting preacher whose support first for the American and then the French Revolutions brought him public controversy, and in the case of the latter, triggered Edmund Burke's classic denunciation of 1789.

Jonathan Clark probes the anti-Catholic actions and millenarian rhetoric of 18th-century America, challenging the assumption that 1776 was solely a product of secular and constitutional impulses.

Jack N. Rakove tells how 'the miracle at Philadelphia' 200 years ago was an amalgam of high principles and backroom wheeler-dealing, to provide safeguards for the smaller states.

The symbols, slogans, ideas and architecture of the Founding Fathers were saturated in the world of Ancient Greece and Rome.

'My country, right or wrong' – but which country? The dilemmas of allegiance posed for Americans by the outbreak of war between the colonies and the British Crown led a cross-section of that society into the loyalist camp, including (with an eye to the main chance) 'the most brilliant soldier of the Continental Army', as Esmond Wright describes.

At the Boston Tea Party the Americans not only flouted the unpopular tax laws on tea imposed on the colony, they also retrieved the image of the Mohawk from the hands of British cartoonists and reinstated him as the symbol of American liberty.