The American Revolution

In this webinar that was originally hosted exclusively for Ashbrook Director’s Club members on July 15, 2020, Executive Director Jeff Sikkenga discussed Ashbrook’s latest Core Documents volume, The American Revolution, with the volume’s editor, Dr. Robert McDonald, Professor of History at the United States Military Academy at West Point.

In line with John Adams’s remark that the Revolution began 15 years before blood was shed, the volume tells the story of events from 1761 and 1783, with the Declaration of Independence at the core. Hundreds of teachers have already ordered the volume. And with the help of these teachers, thousands of students will discover for themselves the significance of the Revolution and what it means to be an American.

During the webinar, Jeff and Dr. McDonald discussed why the American Revolution was about more than mere independence and why the principles of the Declaration of Independence hold our best hope for freedom and justice today.

Jeff and Dr. McDonald discussed the following documents:

“Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death,” Patrick Henry, 23 March 1775

Draft of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson, 2 July 1776

Stratford, Connecticut’s Thomas Gage and Monmouth County, N.J.’s Dunmore, New-England Chronicle, 30 May 1776

List of Prints to Illustrate British Cruelties, Benjamin Franklin and Marquis De Lafayette, May 1779

An Officer’s Account of Washington’s Newburgh Address, Captain Samuel Shaw, April 1783

A recording of the webinar is available below: