A Republic of Scoundrels: The Schemers, Intriguers, and Adventurers Who Created a New American Nation

by David Head (Editor), Timothy Hemmis (Editor)

Overview

The Founding Fathers are often revered as American saints; here are the stories of those Founders who were schemers and scoundrels, vying for their own interests ahead of the nation’s.

We now have a clear-eyed understanding of Founding Fathers such as George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and Alexander Hamilton; even so, they are often considered American saints, revered for their wisdom and self-sacrificing service to the nation. However, within the Founding Generation lurked many unscrupulous figures—men who violated the era’s expectation of public virtue and advanced their own interests at the expense of others.

They were turncoats and traitors, opportunists and con artists, spies, and foreign intriguers. Some of their names are well known: Benedict Arnold and Aaron Burr. Others are less notorious now but were no less threatening. There was Charles Lee, the Continental Army general who offered to tell the British how to defeat the Americans, and James Wilkinson, who served fifteen years as a commanding general in the US Army, despite rumors that he spied for Spain and conspired with traitors.

The early years of the republic were full of self-interested individuals, sometimes succeeding in their plots, sometimes failing, but always shaping the young nation. A Republic of Scoundrels seeks to re-examine the Founding Generation and replace the hagiography of the Founding Fathers with something more realistic: a picture that embraces the many facets of our nation’s origins.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781639364077
Publisher:	Pegasus Books
Publication date:	12/05/2023
Pages:	368
Sales rank:	68,629
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.40(d)

About the Author

David Head (editor) is an associate lecturer of history at the University of Central Florida and a distinguished faculty fellow in history at Kentucky Wesleyan College. He is the author of Privateers of the Americas: Spanish American Privateering from the United States in the Early Republic and A Crisis of Peace: George Washington, the Newburgh Conspiracy, and the Fate of the American Revolution, which was a finalist for the 2020 George Washington Prize.

Timothy Hemmis (editor) is an assistant professor of history at Texas A&M University-Central Texas. He graduated from The University of Southern Mississippi. Timothy's teaching focuses on Early American History and American Military History. He serves as the Regional Coordinator for the Southwest for the Society for Military History and is the History Book Review editor for The Presidential Studies Quarterly. Hemmis has written opinion pieces for the Washington Post and has delivered speeches at the Army and Navy Club in Washington, DC, the War and Society Working Group at Texas A&M University College Station, and the US Army III Corps Senior Command at Fort Hood.

Editorial Reviews

10/09/2023

Historians Head (A Crisis of Peace) and Hemmis demonstrate in this wide-ranging and entertaining collection how Revolutionary-era America was “a time of fluid national identity.” Aiming to explore the “full, contradictory” story of America’s origins, the editors assemble a team of fellow historians to profile a wide range of “self-interested and sometimes unscrupulous individuals” whom, the editors argue, should also be considered America’s “founders.” Subjects include Revolutionary War traitor Benedict Arnold, “one of the greatest scoundrels in American history”; Irish-born congressman Matthew Lyon, a member of the House of Representatives who “mocked the president, brawled on the chamber floor, and spat in a colleague’s face”; Thomas Green, who launched an attack against Spanish Natchez (in modern day Mississippi) on behalf of the state of Georgia; the Kemper brothers—Reuben, Nathan, and Samuel—who instigated “a rebellion that threatened the uneasy peace between the United States and Spain in the Gulf South”; and Aaron Burr, who killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel in 1804 and afterward plotted to found a new country west of the Appalachian mountains. While some entries are more accomplished than others, together they add up to an informative volume that successfully portrays America’s founding as a rocky and complicated affair. Revolutionary War buffs will be engrossed. (Dec.)

Publishers Weekly

"A Republic of Scoundrels is a feisty romp through early American history, full of corruption, greed, and misunderstood antiheroes. The book provides an innovative approach to the clashing imperial interests feuding on the borders of the new and emerging United States. Republic of Scoundrels proves that scoundrels are a timeless element in the American story, but they defined the Early Republic."

Lindsay M. Chervinksy

Praise for David Head’s A Crisis of Peace:

From the Publisher

Meticulous and balanced, A Crisis of Peace lays out the vitally important circumstances that led to a critical moment in our nation's history and Washington’s indispensable role in preserving the peace.

Shelf Awareness

This work is written in a flowing and engaging style that is accessible and yet maintains rigorous standards for scholarship. Head writes with a sense of humor that is sure to bring some extra delight to readers. For anyone interested in the end of the war and the social, political, and economic factors of the time, this book is a must read.

Journal of the American Revolution

"A superb historian who writes in beautiful detail about the heat of political competition. With a rich cast of characters, this book delivers a keen chronicle of a much-vaunted conspiracy.

Andrew Burstein

"David Head tells the story masterfully with new details and expert drama, putting the crisis in both a contemporary context and showing its relevance for all ages.

Douglas Bradburn

"Vividly written. Captures the perilous period when Washington’s fundamental decency meant more to the nation than more glorious qualities might have.

David O. Stewart

"A thoroughly original take on one of the most critical moments in history that would determine no less than the success or failure of the American Revolution.

Craig Bruce Smith

"A masterful job telling the story of how the American Revolution ended. Thoroughly researched and superbly written, keeping the reader engaged until the end. A must have book.

Brian Mack

10/01/2023

A host of knowledgeable scholars and historians explore the charlatans, thieves, traitors, and others who helped found the U.S., as they shine light on their misdeeds in a collection of highly readable essays. Via detailed accounts of the lives of Benedict Arnold, James Wilkinson, the Kemper brothers, and many others, each essay examines the influences and cultures in which they lived and how those could have affected their poor decisions. The book also mentions facts about many of the founding fathers who enslaved people, and how others contributed to the legends of the biography subjects, such as Arnold's second wife Peggy Shippen, who is fabled to have seduced him into betrayal. Editors Head (history, Univ. of Central Florida, Kentucky Wesleyan Coll.; Fate of the American Revolution) and Hemmis (history, Texas A&M Univ.) have overseen a strong project with this work. VERDICT With authoritative narrative in each essay, this book won't make readers love these scoundrels of U.S. history, but they might just learn something new and find some humanity in them.—Jack Phoenix

Library Journal

★ 2023-08-29
A rogues' gallery of conniving, treasonous men among those who shaped the early American republic.

The leaders of the early republic are often portrayed as having unanimity of purpose and being comprised of the most honorable and upstanding characters. However, this collection of short biographies edited by history professors Head and Hemmis points out the foibles, contrarian thought, and outright scandalous behavior of some their ranks. Vividly written, well-researched contributions by first-class scholars make the story of the early U.S. more complete, interesting, and revealing. As Hemmis notes in his introduction, these profiles reveal “the many ways to be a scoundrel in the Revolutionary period.” Among several dubious firsts for the new nation are the first federal employee to be impeached (William Blount); the first man to win a congressional seat while jailed (Matthew Lyon); and the first man to be attacked in the House chamber (also Lyon). The book depicts dastardly land speculators seizing upon westward expansion, scheming with foreign powers, and cheating Native Americans and Revolutionary War veterans alike. Other shady characters include a high-ranking general who offered the British a plan to defeat the Revolution (Charles Lee); another general whose “scheming led to the deaths of six US soldiers” (James Wilkinson); and the defendant in a sensational 1801 murder trial (Jason Fairbanks). The essays present a necessary reminder that the founding generation was all too human. Some were geniuses of the highest rank whose establishment and advancement of the American republic is an achievement of great magnitude. Yet this thoughtful and valuable book demonstrates that others were self-serving men on the make whose dishonorable traits and practices were sometimes antithetical or treasonous to the American cause—but also as American as the 4th of July.

A fascinating look at the darker side of early American history.

Kirkus Reviews

"A Republic of Scoundrels is a rogues’ gallery of the shadiest, most dishonest, self-serving, and duplicitous characters who traipsed across the stage of the early American republic. In this insightful and enjoyable anthology, Tim Hemmis and David Head have gathered together a collection of talented historians whose chapters illuminate the schemers, intriguers, and adventurers who created the new American nation. Ranging from the distasteful, to the outrageous, to the repulsive, these figures helped shape the contours and texture of the Early Republic and the course of American development for years to come."

Ricardo A. Herrera

"It took all kinds to make up the early republic. Unsurprisingly, not a few of them were better suited to Hell than halos. Welcome to a fascinating convocation of the misfits, miscreants, and chancers, who sometimes purposely—and often inadvertently—helped to build America. From the darkest days of the Revolution to Americans' early leaps across the Mississippi, these schemers and would-be empire builders impacted their times, some to become legends, and others pariahs. Taken together, as a fine cast of authors demonstrates, they truly make up A Republic of Scoundrels."

William C. Davis

"In A Republic of Scoundrels, the down and dirty side of the American Revolution and its aftermath is revealed in all of its scandalous glory. Despite the mythos that surrounds the event, this book shows that the seedy underbelly of war played a critical role in shaping 'The Glorious Cause.’ As much as we like to remember pride and patriotism, sometimes murder, unrest, and espionage was lurking just around the corner."

Brady Crytzer

"This wonderful collection of essays highlights the exploits of the villains who helped shape the Revolutionary Era and the early American Republic. From Benedict Arnold and Charles Lee to William Blount, Matthew Lyon, James Wilkinson, Aaron Burr, and Florida’s notorious Kemper Brothers, the book reveals the radically different paths to becoming a notorious scoundrel. While the creation of the American Republic required the demi-gods we often praise, the stories featured here offer an interesting yet contradictory story of the American founding beyond the efforts of the famed founding fathers."

Gene Allen Smith

"A Republic of Scoundrels shine a distinctive light on the first decades of American independence. They illuminate how the same conditions—the fragility of the union, the hostility of the new nation’s neighbors, the uncertainty of the people’s loyalties, and the fluidity of social and cultural expectations—that struck real fear in the hearts of Washington, Hamilton, Jefferson, and Madison represented alluring opportunities for a different set of men, at no small cost to their reputations at the time and since."

James E. Lewis

"A Republic of Scoundrels brings together a motley mix of fascinating, sometimes perplexing, and always entertaining individuals to paint a new portrait of the early American republic. While none of those in this book are considered Founders, and in fact, as this book shows, they often tried to undermine the fledgling nation, their failed schemes, duplicitous acts, and otherwise untoward behavior often proved unexpectedly important to shoring up the country’s foundations.

Partick Spero

A Republic of Scoundrels captures the moral confusion of the era, when the rules of democratic politics were still unwritten and everything seemed up for grabs. The essays show how changeable the line between heroism and opportunism could be.

The Wall Street Journal