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From: Don Williams -  small.corgi@verizon.net


1) Re Joan Gundersen comments on militia performance at Cowpens (11 April),
I would note that almost all of her cited references are 20-50 years old:
Royster (1980), James Kirby Martin/Mark Lender (1982), John Alden(1954),
Marshall Smelser (1973), Howard Peckham (1958), Harry Ward (1995).  I need
more info regarding Hugh Rankin's "The American Revolution" --I have been
unable to locate it.  I note,however, that Hugh Rankin's book on Francis
Marion did not consider the militia "a weak reed"  on the Southern
battlefields of the Revolution.


While I have not read all of Ms Gundersen's cited references , they appear
to be general works on the Revolution as a whole -- with only a few pages
devoted to Cowpens?
By contrast, Lawrence Babit's book "A Devil of A Whipping" --cited in my
initial post  (April 10) -- is recent (1998) scholarship focused entirely
on the Battle of Cowpens.
The same is true of another of my citations --Colonel Morelock's 163-page
monograph "Cowpens Staff Ride"  (1996)  -- available at the US Army Command
and General Staff College's website at
http://www-cgsc.army.mil/carl/CSIPUBS/Moncure/moncure.htm.


Again, the issue is whether Michael Bellesiles' "Arming America" is
objective scholarship which tries to accurately portray what is currently
known about the Revolutionary War.


2) Ms Gundersen's suggests that the militias' tendency to retreat from
British bayonet charges made them a "weak reed in battle".  An alternative
view is  that the militias used different tactics from the regulars because
of their weapons.
The militiaman's rifle had greater accuracy than the regular's musket but
could only be reloaded/fired roughly once per minute vice the 3-4 times per
minute for the musket.


Something not often noted is that the southern militia were often mounted
on horseback, giving them great mobility compared to the marching infantry
of the British.  Cornwallis noted the fine horses of the militia as a
factor in their ability to suddenly coalesce and destroy Ferguson's army at
King's Mountain.


Hence, it made military sense for the mounted riflemen of the militia to
use hit-and-run  tactics to hit British weak points (depot raids, supply
line ambushes, foraging party ambushes) vice standup battles.  Some
criticisms of the militias seem akin to arguing that the Parthians and
Attila's Huns were "weak reeds" against the Roman legions because they
didn't stand and fight.


The US Army's Center of Military History reference "American Military
History" notes:


"...The militiamen have been generally maligned as useless by one school of
thought, and glorified by  another as the true victors in the war. In any
balanced view it must be recognized that their  contributions were great,
though they would have counted for little without a Continental Army  to
give the American cause that continued sustenance that only a permanent
force in being could  give it. It was the ubiquity of the militia that made
British victories over the Continentals in  the field so meaningless. And
the success with which the militia did operate derived from the  firm
political control the patriots had established  over the countryside long
before the British were in any position to challenge it--the situation that
made the British task so difficult in the first place." (Source:
http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/books/AMH/AMH-04.htm )


3) It seems to me that Bellesiles relentlessly attacks the early militia
throughout several hundred pages of "Arming America".  The question is
why?? -- neither the secondary sources nor the primary sources Bellesiles
cites justify such an attack.  The sources that Bellesiles references in
Arming America for his description of Cowpens -- Don Higginbotham's "Daniel
Morgan, Revolutionary Rifleman" and Banestre Tarleton's "Campaigns of
1780-1781 in the the Southern Provinces of North America" do not support
Bellesiles' judgment (Arming America,p 197-8) that "the militia kept
blundering around the field" and that Howard's  Continentals saved the
day.  Tarleton notes that Howard's Line included 300 "back woodsmen" in
addition to 500 Continentals. (p.216)  Higginbotham concurs that Howard's
Line included Virgina and Georgia militia.
Higginbotham notes (p 140-141) that Picken's militia was thrown onto
Tarleton's left flank at the  critical moment and helped cause the British
collapse.


In fairness to Bellesiles, Higginbotham's 1961 text does (mistakenly) state
that the militia on the far  right of Howard's line caused an unplanned
movement to the rear.  As noted in my April 10 post, Lawrence  Babits 1999
text "A Devil of a Whipping" indicates that a CONTINENTAL unit under
Captain Wallace was responsible for starting the unplanned
retreat.  Colonel Howard's account of Cowpens agreed that the fault was
Wallace's and notes that Wallace was a "regular".


4) Except for Cowpens, Bellesiles doesn't discuss the guerrilla war in the
South. Yet US Army historians and Army officers still study the Southern
Campaign and how it set Cornwallis up for the decisive defeat at Yorktown
that won the war. After the southern part of the Continental Army was
destroyed at the Battle of Charleston --and the small remaining units were
destroyed at Camden-- the war in the South was carried  out by guerrilla
bands led by Pickens, Francis Marion, Sumter,etc.
General
Nathanael Green, who took over from Gates, relied heavily on the militias
to supplement his small Continental Army force while he tried to
reconstitute his forces.


Bellesiles doesn't discuss the southern militia's victory at King's
Mountain in 1780 -- the victory in a year of despair that revitalized the
Patriot cause and convinced the French king to give Congress a much-needed
loan.  Regarding King's Mountain, the US Army's American  Military History
notes:


"In the summer of 1780 the American cause seemed to be at as low an ebb as
it had been after the New York campaign in 1776 or after the defeats at
Ticonderoga and Brandywine in 1777. Defeat in the south was not the only
discouraging aspect of patriot affairs. In the north a creeping paralysis
had set in as the patriotic enthusiasm of the


early war years waned. The Continental currency had virtually depreciated
out of existence, and Congress was impotent to pay the soldiers or purchase
supplies. At Morristown, New Jersey, in the winter of 1779-8O the army
suffered worse hardships than at Valley Forge. Congress could do little but
attempt to shift its responsibilities onto the states. Under such
difficulties, Washington had to struggle to hold even a small Army
together. Recruiting of Continentals, difficult to begin with, became
almost impossible when the troops could neither be paid nor supplied
adequately and had to suffer such winters as those at Morristown.
Enlistments and drafts from the militia in 1780 produced not quite half as
many men for one year's service as had enlisted in 1775 for three years or
the duration. While recruiting lagged, morale among those men who had
enlisted for the longer terms naturally fell. Mutinies in 1780 and 1781
were suppressed only by measures of great severity. Arnold's treason in
September 1780 marked the nadir of the patriot cause. It was the frontier
militia assembling "when they were about to be attacked in their own homes"
who struck the blow that actually marked the turning point in the south."
(Source: http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/books/AMH/AMH-04.htm )


5)Bellesiles judgments on the militias' performance in other battles also
seems  contrary to that of historians who have written in-depth books on
those battles.
On page 174 of Arming America, Bellesiles argues that the militia
performance and  marksmanship at Concord/Lexington was poor.  His judgment
is not supported by David Hackett  Fischer's 1994 study "Paul Revere's
Ride".  Fischer explains that the British column retreating back to Boston
was not a sitting duck:  The British put strong units  on the flanks of
their column during the retreat back to Boston and those
skirmishers  attacked American militia when the militia tried to get close
to the main column.


Similarly, Bellesiles' argument that cannon won the 1815 Battle of New
Orleans and his dismissal of the Kentucky riflemen is not supported by
Robert Remini's 1999 study "The Battle of New Orleans".


6) In the January William and Mary Quarterly, Bellesiles responds to Ira
Gruber's criticism by stating that "Over the past twenty years military
historians have subjected their faith in the militia to withering fire,
showing it to be an ideology with few connections to reality."  Yet the
sources Bellesiles then references do not support his statement.  Charles
Royster's "A Revolutionary People at War" notes the suffering of the
Continental Army and criticizes the shortcomings of some
militias.  However, Royster also notes "Scholars who have studied the
service of the militia demonstrate its usefulness as an auxiliary to the
army's effort to prevent British control of territory and
population".  This role was not unimportant.
Unlike the militia, the Continental Army was vitally dependent upon a long
system of supply, depots, and a transportation network stretching over
hundreds of miles.  The militia protected this supply system.


Another Bellesiles reference, Don Higginbotham's collection of essays
("Reconsiderations on the Revolutionary War") also support the importance
of the militias' contributions.
John Shy's essay notes that the militias prevented the British from
establishing a Loyalist puppet government in the South.  Arthur Bowler
describes the Continental Army's dependence on the American economy and on
an extensive supply/transportation system.
He describes the extreme weakness of Washington's army in 1780 --the year
of militia victories in the South.  He also describes how militia ambushes
of British supply lines and foraging parties hamstrung British offensive
operations and kept the British tied down to coastal cities and coastal rivers.


In his essay, "The American Militia: A Traditional Institution with
Revolutionary Responsibilities", Don Higginbotham in fact states " Indeed,
for this very reason-- that so much was demanded of the local
contingents--I believe that the overall impression of the militia should be
one of admiration, not derision." (page 95).
Higginbotham then goes on to list some of the important contributions of
the militias which I have already discussed.  He notes Cornwallis' grudging
compliment: " I will not say much in praise of the militia of the Southern
Colonies, but the list of British officers and soldiers killed and wounded
by them..proves but too fatally that they are not wholly contemptible."


On page 103, Higginbotham ends with a judgement of his own regarding the
militia: "Seldom has an armed force done so much with so little--providing
a vast reservoir of manpower for a multiplicity of military needs, fighting
(often unaided by Continentals) in the great majority of the 1,331 land
engagements of the war."


7) In my personal opinion, Arming America's negative depiction of the early
militias is not supported by historical sources--neither primary nor
secondary.  In my opinion, Bellesiles misleads his readers --few of whom
are likely to perform independent research or to check his citations.


8) Part of the criticism of Bellesiles and Arming America may arise from a
misunderstanding.
One-sided and misleading arguments are fatal flaws in objective scholarship
but are considered fair, even admirable, in political and legal arguments.


My question to H-OIEAHC is: Is Arming America a political argument or is it
objective historical scholarship?


9) A Feb 2000 article Linguafranca explains what is politically at stake:
an upcoming Supreme Court precedent-setting ruling on the Second Amendment
(US vs Emerson) See http://www.linguafranca.com/0002/showdown.html .


A short summary, based on my understanding of the article:


a) Many experts in Constitutional Law, including liberals, have concluded
that the Second Amendment supports an individual right to bear arms. This
growing body of legal scholarship has influenced recent federal court
rulings, e.g., ruling in US vs Emerson (circa October 2001) that there is
such a right.


b) A set of historians appear to have tried to discredit/undermine this
consensus by arguing that the Law Professors understanding of early
American history is flawed -- Bellesiles is apparently one member of this
group.  Some other historians who appear to share similar views are Garry
Wills and Carl T. Bogus.


10) Some of Bellesiles earlier writings were cited by gun control advocates
who filed Amicus Curiae in US vs Emerson -- see
http://news.findlaw.com/cnn/docs/gunlawsuits/emerson/ and search for
"Bellesiles."


In an amicus curiae to US Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit, re US vs
Emerson, David Yassky (Brooklyn Law School) argued that Judge Sam Cummings
decision (that the Second Amendment provides an individual right to own
firearms ) should be overturned. Mr. Yassky's brief included signatures of
52 scholars supporting his brief -- one
of whom apparently was Michael Bellesiles. (See
http://www.potomac-inc.org/yass.html and link to 52 co-signers at
http://www.potomac-inc.org/yass.html#amici.)


On February 16, 2000, the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence hosted a
"distinguished group of historians" at the National Press Club in
Washington, D.C., "to challenge the gun lobby's on-going campaign of
misinformation about the Second Amendment." Mr. Bellesiles was one of four
speakers at the symposium -- see
http://www.gunlawsuits.org/defend/second/symposium/symposium.asp and
http://www.gunlawsuits.org/defend/second/symposium/speakers.asp


11) FirstMonday2001, a gun control advocacy group, describes the
contribution Mr. Bellesiles and other historians made to the journal
"Constitution Commentary" -- see
http://www.firstmonday2000.com/lawyers.cfm:
--------------------------------------------------------- "Some of the most
recent and interesting criticism of the 'Standard Model' has come from
early American historians. They argue very forcefully that


the so-called "Standard Model" is wrong, and that the law professors and


lawyers who created it did an embarrassingly poor job of analyzing and
writing about this history. Several of these articles appeared together in
a recent volume of Constitutional Commentary:


Saul Cornell, "Commonplace or Anachronism: The Standard Model, the Second
Amendment, and the Problem of History in Contemporary Constitutional
Theory," 16 Constitutional Commentary 221 (1999).


Michael Bellesiles, "Suicide Pact: New Readings of the Second Amendment,"
16 Constitutional Commentary 247 (1999).


Don Higginbotham, "The Second Amendment in Historical Context," 16
Constitutional Commentary 263 (1999).


Historian and author Gary Wills has also written a scathing critique of the
"Standard Model" and its proponents' techniques: Gary Wills, "To Keep and
Bear Arms," N.Y. Review of Books, Sept. 21, 1995."
-------------------------------------


Mr. Bellesiles article "Suicide Pact: New Readings of the Second
Amendment," is available here: http://www.potomac-inc.org/mbelles.html


12) Mr. Bellesiles is entitled to promote his political opinions, of course.
It would be good if more scholars became involved in our national political
discourse.   But how does a scholar make clear to the public when he is
providing personal opinions or political arguments versus when he is
attempting to state objective, historical truth as we best know it?


Yet, if such a distinction is not made, will America's history departments
not lose the support of US taxpayers if said taxpayers feel , perhaps
mistakenly, that historians are creating false history to support political
positions -- as discussed by Michael Foucault?



In closing, my apologies for my slow response.  I was in Australia for
three weeks.
My post of April 10 had actually been submitted back in March but was not
put up until April 10.

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