Creative History

  On July 5, 1777 Philadelphia’s most widely read daily broadsheet The Pennsylvania Evening Post described the previous day’s Independence Day celebrations in the city as, “A demonstration of joy and festivities.” In an outpouring of patriotic fervor according to the Pennsylvania Evening Post , ship’s in the harbor along the banks of the Delaware River were said to be, “Dressed in the gayest manner with the colors of the United States and red, white and blue streamers displayed.” It was reported that day, that as the fittingly decorated ships approached the city--America’s newly minted first capital city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, that thirteen cannon shots were fired--one cannon blast for each former British colony that had only the year before turned newly independent state, part of the loose confederation now known as the United States of America. That night thirteen fireworks were set off in the large green spaces known as the city commons of both Philadelphia, the nasc...

  In early September of 1780 two soldiers of the line from Massachusetts, Michael Logan and Daniel Power, both hungry and disillusioned with the American cause after years of service in the Continental Army, crossed the Hudson River at Fort Lee, New Jersey, and turned themselves over to British forces stationed in New York City. That August George Washington at the head of an army of 14,000 troops marched south from Orangetown, New York and crossed into Bergen County, New Jersey.            Washington is hoping to be able to meet up with a combined French land and naval force heading northward and trap the British in New York City before winter sets in.  British Encampments on Manhattan If Washington and his army, along with the French can do so, then perhaps, the combined weight of the Franco-American forces can decimate the main British army encamped around New York City and force Parliament to pressure King George III to finally recog...

            Friday morning begins normally enough.  It is cloudy and overcast, a little gloomy with a slight chill in the air but it is nothing that the residents of New England aren’t used to.  After all, this time of year the temperature does fluctuate rapidly, with one day being warm and humid, summerlike, and the next cold and stark almost like winter. It is May 19, 1780 and the New England and Mid-Atlantic states have been in the grip of America’s War for Independence for over five years.  Much of the countryside is ravaged, many of the cities are still under British control, but led by George Washington, the Continental Army of the United States continues to survive and the spirit of American patriotism is proving resilient and indomitable.  There is reason for both hope and despair, but no one expects what this day is about to bring. At around ten in the morning the overcast sky begins to change colors turning from a pi...

“They were merely walking skeletons without clothes to cover their nakedness...covered with lice and vermin from head to foot.” --Captain Alexander Coffin prisoner aboard HMS Jersey 1781 As day breaks you can see it rising like a flat-topped hill in the distance.  The gutted hulk sitting there motionless and sunk in the mudflats of Wallabout Bay that you’ve heard about in rumors, the most infamous of rumors, among men in the army.  Your heart rate quickens as your footsteps take you closer. While you’re still over two hundred yards away from it, already, you can smell it.  The stench of the combined filth and decay of over 1,000 starving and dying men being lifted to your nostrils as it’s borne aloft by the early morning breeze. Your knees tremble.  You feel faint and think of running away.  But one glance to the right and left and you see the Redcoats standing guard over you and you realize that any attempt at escape will end either with a British b...