Revolution was won around here

Charlotte Observer ^ | Jul. 22, 2007 | DAN HUNTLEY

[Dysart]

Any book on the Scots-Irish contributions to the western world is must-read material, IMO. I say that as someone who is completely unbiased...

[Colonel Kangaroo]

Just in case this thread somehow develops into a defense of the Confederate States of America, the Overmountain Men and the soldiers from the Watauga settlement were in an area which later became one of the strongest pro-Union areas in the nation, North or South, during the Civil War. I suspect a good number, maybe even the majority, of the descendants of the Overmountain Men were Union supporters in the later war.

If the central role of the South in the Revelation is a generally unknown fact, the presence of significant southern mountain sentiment for Lincoln and the Union is another.

[Pharmboy]

Interesting point that I, for one, was TOTALLY unaware of. Why were the descendants of the Overmountain Men Union-sympathizers?

[Pharmboy]

Well, the “Shot Heard Round the World” was significant enough to be famous even w/o The General.

[Pharmboy]

The map came from here (scroll down a bit) and is said to be based on an illustration from Draper, p. 257.

[x]

There were a lot of Loyalists in South Carolina, so much of the early fighting was between American factions, not with the British. The Scots of North Carolina also tended to support the monarchy, and the battle of Moore's Creek in North Carolina in 1776 pitted Patriot militia against a Loyalist militia largely composed of the local Scots.

In the later years of the war, the British assumed that they could win over a majority of South Carolinians to their cause, but Banastre Tarleton's brutality and other Redcoat outrages worked to the benefit of the revolutionaries. The Waxhaw massacre and other atrocities turned the state against the monarchy.

The first phase of the war occurred in New England. After the New England Colonies were freed of British forces the action moved to the Middle Colonies and then the South. The British reckoned they'd have more support in provinces where the Anglican influence was stronger, so there was no attempt to retake New England.

A lot of the troops who fought in the later phases of the war were still New Englanders who'd signed on earlier, though. That was particularly true in the Middle Colonies -- New York and Philadelphia were still in British hands and troops were tied up in battles there. But the 1st Rhode Island Regiment fought at Yorktown. It had been reorganized in 1778 as an all African-American unit.

[MikeD]

American History PING, in case you weren’t included in the earlier ping.

[GretchenM]

I was educated in the North and had about the same amount of ink in my public school textbooks regarding the Revolutionary War battles and strategies. It was always a mystery to me why the blood was drawn out of that war but not our Civil War, which got considerably more coverage.

In the last several years I’ve been reading books on the campaigns, leaders, and character of the Revolutionary War. It remains a mystery to me why this information is shunted aside and almost all of the *glory* goes to the guys with quill, paper, and debating skills, for founding our nation.

[Pharmboy]

You make excellent points.

While the orators and quill-pushers were obviously important, without the men in the field with sword, musket and cannon it all would have been an exercise in debating skills and the Union Jack would still have flown.

[Colonel Kangaroo]

Many of the descendants stayed in the mountainous areas of the state. This was always a Whig Party stronghold, and as also an area with little slavery, these two factors produced a region that never approved of the secession movement arising in the lower western regions.

And what I've found from our own East Tennessee family, all the Civil War descendants of the two Watauga/Sevier associates in our ancestry were either Union soldiers or very strong Unionist sympathizers.