The Politics of War: Race, Class, and Conflict in Revolutionary Virginia

by Michael A. McDonnell

Overview

War often unites a society behind a common cause, but the notion of diverse populations all rallying together to fight on the same side disguises the complex social forces that come into play in the midst of perceived unity. Michael A. McDonnell uses the Revolution in Virginia to examine the political and social struggles of a revolutionary society at war with itself as much as with Great Britain.

McDonnell documents the numerous contests within Virginia over mobilizing for war--struggles between ordinary Virginians and patriot leaders, between the lower and middle classes, and between blacks and whites. From these conflicts emerged a republican polity rife with racial and class tensions.

Looking at the Revolution in Virginia from the bottom up, The Politics of War demonstrates how contests over waging war in turn shaped society and the emerging new political settlement. With its insights into the mobilization of popular support, the exposure of social rifts, and the inversion of power relations, McDonnell's analysis is relevant to any society at war.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780807839041
Publisher:	Omohundro Institute and UNC Press
Publication date:	12/01/2012
Series:	Published by the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture and the University of North Carolina Press
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	568
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Michael A. McDonnell is a Senior Lecturer in history at the University of Sydney. He also is an Organization of American Historians' Distinguished Lecturer.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments     vii
List of Maps     xv
Abbreviations and Short Titles     xvii
Introduction     1
The Ebullition of Patriotism
Mustering Patriotism: The Problem of Popular Mobilization, 1774-1775     19
Those Who Aim at Too Much: The Revolution Begins     49
Checking Wild Irregular Sallies: Patriot Leaders Reassert Control     75
Movements for Independence
Plebeian Infamy: The Minutemen and Their World     105
The Burning of Norfolk: Patriot Leaders Become Reluctant Revolutionaries     135
The Spirit of Levelling: Movements for Independence, January-May 1776     175
Revolutionary Settlement: Creating a New Government     216
The Limits of Allegiance
Fit for Common Service? Mobilization Problems, 1776-1777     247
The Politics of Lower-Class Draft Resistance, 1777-1778     281
Paralysis and Division, 1778-1780     315
Revolution of Fools and Knaves
Revolutionary Demands: War Comes to the South     367
Asserting Fundamental Rights: Militia Service and Resistance, 1781     398
Defeat     435
Toward the New Republic: The Revolutionary Legacy of the War for Independence     479
Index     529

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

Here, in the great tradition of history from below, is a powerful new interpretation of the American Revolution in Virginia, its most important setting. By giving authoritative voice to small farmers, tenants, laborers, and servants in their struggles for independence, McDonnell has emerged as a major new voice in early American history.—Marcus Rediker, University of Pittsburgh

This fine book examines the discontent and violence that tore at the fabric of Virginian society as it mobilized for war. These upheavals, rooted in class and racial tensions, transformed the political landscape of Virginia and the nation.—Caroline Cox, University of the Pacific

McDonnell unearths to telling view the disaffection and discontent of middling and poorer folk, including blacks. He crafts a fresh understanding of class and race in the making of the new American nation. . . . A must and delightful read for any serious student of the early Republic.—Thomas J. Davis, Arizona State University

With painstaking research and keen insights, McDonnell reveals hidden dimensions of the American Revolution. He illuminates the lives of common Virginians and their struggles to shape a truly democratic republic.—Alan Taylor, University of California, Davis

Editorial Reviews

Required reading for students of the American Revolution.—The Historian

One of the strongest demonstrations yet of the inseparability of the social from the political questions of the Revolutionary era. . . . Captures the texture and the ironies of the home front in what might best be called the first civil war.—Journal of Southern History

Demands careful reading by all who write or care about eighteenth-century Virginia.—The Journal of American History

There is much that is fresh and valuable in this book.—-American Historical Review

A big book in every sense of the word. . . . Contribute[s] greatly to the social history of the Revolutionary War. . . . Our sense of what the Revolution was and was not is considerably better now than it was before McDonnell's substantial achievement.—William and Mary Quarterly

One of the more important recent additions to American colonial and Revolutionary historiography.—Journal of the Early Republic

McDonnell's impressive research allows him to give a fully rounded story of the multifaceted conflict within Virginia.—Journal of Interdisciplinary History

[An] impressive work. . . . An extremely detailed picture of Virginia at war. . . . [A] deeply researched and radical new take on the War for Independence and the creation of the American Revolution.—Journal of American Studies

Explores in some depth the tension between the elite and allegedly 'plebian' citizens during the Revolutionary War.—Choice

[An] extensively researched, clearly written analysis. . . . Offers a blueprint for how historians should examine the attempts by various groups of Americans to acquire liberty and independence in the second half of the eighteenth century.—Common-place

From the Publisher