John's 'southern narrative' is similar to the Maine experience. > My reading has led me to conclude that the allegiances (patriot/rebel, > loyalist/tory, neutral) were not nearly so deep nor nearly so permanent as > modern descendents would like to believe. The choice was not nearly so > clear cut as our hindsight would lead us to believe. One's choice to be on > one side or the other, in some cases, was not made voluntarily. It was > not at all uncommon for persons to change sides, sometimes more than once. There are a lot of useless stereotypes in use today -- i.e., Tories were the landowners and the Sons of Liberty were a bunch of thieves and thugs -- etc., etc., etc. While there are cases supporting these stereotypes, there are as many cases which support exactly the opposite conditions I think to were several factors involved. I believe that principal factor is that most of the Americans really would perferred not to have chosen sides. By 'most' I mean more than 50%, not Adam's thirds. Secondly, I believe that the political sentiment changed over time as people tired of the deprivations of war. History has shown that the public support of a war declines over time. The AWI 'shooting war' ran for six to eight years depending when one considered the shooting to be over. This was the second longest war in American history with only the Vietnam War being longer (OK! I acknowledge you Korean War vets who claim that war still continues). Finally, geographical location contributed significantly to one's sentiments. The area controlled by the various troops frequently changed. For example, the 'boundaries' marking the New York city perimeter fluctuated but basically resulted in a large 'no man's land' buffer zone ruled by anarchy. This area became uninhabitable because the British/Hessian/Provincial troops would raid on a foraging party on one day and the American foraging party would come the next day followed by the 'cowboys' (as the thugs were then called) followed by the other side's 'cowboys' later in the week. Then, of course, periodically the sides would go out shooting at each other. > Sometimes when a person was captured by their opponents, an option was > given them to switch sides. Since the alternatives were not very > attractive, the option was frequently taken (even if only temporarily). "Captured" sets the bar too high. Any time the settlement/family/person was absorbed into an area under control of one side or the other one's public allegiance typically matched that of the prevailing force. When the British landed at Majabigwaduce [now Castine ME] a proclamation was issued requiring all settlers to come in and sign an oath of allegegiance to the crown. A total of 691 did so. Later 16 were proscribed for breaking their oath by being involved in the American counterattack. Manny later claimed that their oath was non-binding because it was made under duress. What is the story about crossing one's fingers while swearing to tell the truth. . . . > Near the end of the conflict, in the South, anyway, a person who had been a > Loyalist could "erase that record" by serving a certain number of months in > the patriot/rebel militia. Even after such a vitriolic civil war, *most* > loyalists, if they had done nothing really bad, stayed on their land (or > returned to it, by community consent) and continued to attend the same > church they had attended before (but perhaps not allowed to vote on church > matters for 3 years!). The way they lived with it was to "agree not to > talk about it". Many modern descendents of loyalists in the area are > dumbfounded to discover their ancestors were loyalists (the grandchildren > were not told which side granddaddy fought on, they has merely "assumed" he > was a patriot). With the peace of 1783, approximately 600 persons made up the Penobscot Association of Loyalists who went to Nova Scotia [now Charlotte county, New Brunswick] where each adult male received a 100 acre farm lot plus a town lot in St Andrews. A substantial portion of the refugees who had lived in the Penobscot area prior to the British occupation returned to their original properties in Maine. Some sold their Canadian holdings and some left a son or son-in-law on the property. A large portion of the refugees had settled at Penobscot in the belief that the new boundary would be the Penobscot River and had no lasting ties to the area. In fact, the new province between the Penobscot and St Croix rivers was to be called New Ireland and Andrew Oliver was to be the royal governor, etc., etc. Following Cornwallis' Yorktown surrender, the locals at Penobscot started mending bridges. For example, Captain Thomas Fletcher was George Washington's intermediary to the Penobscot Indians in 1776 and in 1782 he is trading at the store at the British Fort Geroge. Until Kenneth Roberts wrote his novel "Oliver Wiswell" which presented the American Loyalist's viewpoint, one never mentioned a relative who was a Loyalist. Even then, there was much controversy because Robert's ventured into territory theretofore considered tabboo. In fact, it was not uncommon to find families with members allied to both sides. In one family hanging in my tree, seven of eleven children were born before June 1767, viz= three boys and four girls: three of the four girls married Loyalists and the two oldest boys served in both militia and Continental service. Another example -- one of the daughters of the Captain of the local company of militia had an illegitimate daughter by one of the Scottish Lieutenants stationed at Castine. The daughter was born five months after the Scots evacuated Castine. > We are sometimes given the impression that after the war, all those who had > been Loyalists lost everything they had and had to leave the country. This > is believed to have been true for only one loyalist in five. Locally, in > some cases, it could well have been five out of five, but overall, the > fraction was much smaller. At least the crown provided compensation for loyal citizens forced into begoming refugees. There were many rebels who had equally severe losses and never received any compensation. > We often hear John Adams being quoted as an authority for saying that the > population was divided evenly into thirds (for/against/neutral). If you > dig deep enough into his writings, you can find him giving other > breakdowns, dependent upon the point he was making. <clip> Sentiments changed too frequently to develop any specific stereotype. [see above discussion] Bob Brooks

RC Brooks wrote: > John's 'southern narrative' is similar to the Maine experience. > > Until Kenneth Roberts wrote his novel "Oliver Wiswell" which presented the > American Loyalist's viewpoint, one never mentioned a relative who was a > Loyalist. Even then, there was much controversy because Robert's ventured > into territory theretofore considered tabboo. In fact, it was not uncommon > to find families with members allied to both sides. This is a wonderful book and a must read for those interested in the Battle of Brooklyn, August 27, 1776. He takes you right up the pathways as though you were riding on Clinton's and Howe's saddles. I am fortunate to own a first edition of this book, 1940, not to be confused with the Limited Edition of 1000 copies where a complete Bibliography of source material consulted during the writing. However, this copy does list the books consulted for the Loyalist side; if of interest I would post. The front matter of the book contains the following quote: In 1821 Chief Justice John Jay said to his nephew William Heathcote DeLancey: "let me tell you, William: the *true* history of the American Revolution can *never* be written". Jay delined to give his reasons, saying, "You must be content to know that the fact is as I have said, and that a great many people in those days were not at all what they seemed, nor what they are generally believed to have been." --Edward Floyd DeLancey's introduction to *Jone's History of New york, lii.* Jan