Just watched the movie "The Patriot," and out of curiosity looked up a British view of

[GreenPartyVoter]

the history of the war: http://www.redcoat.me.uk/Rev-War.htm

"Despite all that has been written about the American Revolution, it seems that very little of what actually happened, or even the correct order that events occurred is known today by the vast majority of Americans. From birth they are taught the war was the utmost expression of liberty and nobility, a notion so sacrosanct that no one seems to question it.How many of them ever read beyond the first few words of the Declaration of Independence to discover the nonsense, fear-mongering, lies and baseless speculation that it contains? How many can see that the winners' efforts to justify their actions have left only one sided accounts,dominated by the grievances of some of the colonists, to be forever compounded by historical and jingoistic narratives that are as much to do with gratifying an opinionated psyche as anything else.So now, effectively unchallenged for well over two centuries and immortalized in American folk lore, is it time for a more objective account?"

Definitely very different from what I was taught here, to be sure. I'm not sure that's a mainstream British view, though. Will have to go looking for more info.

[grantcart]

1. The fundamental myth of the American Revolution is an absurd distortion mixed with

creative amnesia.

To understand the British point of view you have to start in the 1740's when North America looked like this



Starting in the last 1740s and early 1750s the French started building up an extensive fort system and joined in alliances with the different Indian tribes to cut off expansion by the American colonies.

In the mid 1750s colonialists (including Washington) formed into British corp to fight the French/Indian forces.

The British started sending more reinforcements but the French had a commanding advantage by 1757. In 1758 the British started landing what would amount to 50,000 troops ( a huge amount to transport from Europe) at great expense and by 1760 had largely defeated the French, and an Armistice would be signed in 1763. The British continued to house a large body of troops in NA to maintain defense.

In 1763 support among the colonialists was 100% pro British.

In time the threat lessened and eventually forgotten. The British didn't forget and felt that it was time that the colonialists start contributing financially to the costs of their own defense, a reasonable point of view.

The main problem, really, was that the colonies were just to vital and London too far away.

Little events and misunderstandings would blow up and the Crown couldn't respond until time had passed.

See Boston Massacre, for example, where the British troops only fired upon after they were assaulted and were genuinely afraid for their lives.

BTW British historians have assaulted "The Patriot" as one of the worst examples of jingoistic propaganda ever crafted with none of the criminal acts by the British commanders ever happening.

http://entertainment.time.com/2011/01/26/top-10-historically-misleading-films/

“Truth is the first casualty in Hollywood’s war,” read the headline of the London Telegraph‘s take on The Patriot. Principal among the movie’s gross inaccuracies is the portrayal of British soldiers as evil, bloodthirsty sadists. In one scene, redcoats are seen rounding up a village of screaming women, children and old men, locking them in a church and setting the building ablaze. No such thing ever happened in the Revolutionary War. What’s worse? An almost identical crime — one of World War II’s most notorious atrocities — was carried out by Nazi soldiers in France in 1944. Meaning not only did the film paint a portrait of the British as cruel killers, it compared them to history’s worst: the Nazis. As Stephen Hunter, a film critic and historian told the Telegraph, “Any image of the American Revolution which represents you Brits as Nazis and us as gentle folk is almost certainly wrong.”

Another of the film’s egregious oversights lies with lead character Benjamin Martin (Mel Gibson), based on several real-life players in the American Revolution, including Francis “Swamp Fox” Marion, a militia leader from South Carolina. The movie depicts Martin as a family man and hero who single-handedly defeats countless hostile Brits. According to the Guardian, however, evidence suggests the Swamp Fox was a man who actively persecuted Cherokee Indians (killing them for fun) and regularly raped his female slaves. In fact, The Patriot turns a blind eye to slavery altogether, a decision that received much attention from critics including director Spike Lee. “For three hours The Patriot dodged around, skirted about or completely ignored slavery,” Lee wrote in a letter to the Hollywood Reporter. “The Patriot is pure, blatant American Hollywood propaganda. A complete whitewashing of history.”


Read more: http://entertainment.time.com/2011/01/26/top-10-historically-misleading-films/#ixzz2ispEofHv

[GreenPartyVoter]

2. Thank you. That was much more along the lines of what I was looking for.

[hedda_foil]

17. Let's not forget the immortal words of King George III on the subject.

[johnsolaris]

3. french & indian war

Hi,

The French & Indian war, The Seven years war to the British, was the basic cause for our Revolution. This war was in reality a Global conflict & really the First world war. After the war was over, The Crown was for the most part Broke & the British citizens were not happy to be paying more taxes for a war that had ended. The Brits looked for new sources of income & of course looked to the American colonies. A reasonable attitude since many battles had been fought in America, pay your own way.

The crown, like all good keepers of Empire had been using the American colonies as a source for raw materials and the colonist taxes were very low if they paid anything at all. The colonist thought the Crown was asking far too much & one thing led to another & the war broke out. Obvious there is much more in the narrative & that is the wonderful thing about history, finding the truth.

Hollywood does not care to show the truth about history. Mel Gibson is a right wing Repugnent & most of his films are just Propaganda.

The first man to die in the revolution at the Boston massacre was a black man & John Adams was the lawyer for the British soldiers. I was never taught that in school from elementary to college.

[Amerincorporated]

6. Erroneously minimizing British culpability won't help to set record straight

The British refused to allow the Americans equal representation in parliament. Say what you want about "paying our way" for the war fought on our land, that's fine as long as we are then EQUALLY represented in parliament. The distance between the colonies and England certainly contributed to the war, but so did the King's-and the English in General-condescension, patronization and disdain for the colonists. There were a lot of factors, but it takes two to tango. The Americans wanted a fair shake, to be on equal terms with the British, and the British felt they didn't deserve it and were unwilling to recognize American equality under the law.

Today's America is a far cry from equality under the law, especially by our government. US governments openly flaunts it's contempt for rule of law, which has snowballed since Nixon was pardoned. It is now commonplace for American officials to not only break the law, but admit to it and justify it with obscene interpretations of constitutional authority.

History is history. Americans wanted equality with the British, British didn't want to give that concession. That was really what made war unavoidable.

As far as the Boston Massacre, the British were scared, but they were wrong for gunning down unarmed civilians. But John Adams defended them because of his reverence for equality under the law. He was truly one of the America's greatest. He would be disgusted by the way the law is twisted and manipulated and ignored today.

[Sweeney]

12. Just as bankruptcy preceeded the English Revolution

It preceeded ours, and all revolutions for that matter. This people gave a lot of bodies to the French Indian war, and suffered a big hit from it. The idea that this people should pay for a war from which they saw no tangible benefits really was insane. I understand the British army did most of the actual fighting, and that the cost was considerable, but their professional army like our own produced so many flunky generals incapable of using men and resources correctly that it is a wonder they could win at all. They were broke. They picked the wrong people to pay their bills.

And you see that trend today, laying more and more of the cost of the government on those who profit the least by it.

Big mistake; but I encourage them to make it.

[kag]

4. Another little-taught, rarely-learned cause of the American Revolution...

Just as today, the wealthy of the colonies would often send the less wealthy to fight their wars for them. During the Seven Years/French and Indian War, the wealthy Nobility in the colonies planned to pay those soldiers in land once the war was over, and the land they had their eyes on was the trans-montane Appalachian land--the land west of the mountains that they had just wrested from French and Indian control--well, French control anyway. The Indians who fought on the side of the French for the very reason that they didn't want to give up their ancestral home and hunting territory to the land-hungry British colonists, never agreed to give up their rights to that land. And therein lay the problem.

While the wealthy colonists might have wanted to pay their soldiers in trans-montane land, the King had other ideas. He was less willing to "use" that land until he could come to some kind of peace with its current occupants--the Indians. King George III had been alarmed at the constant struggles between colonists and natives, and so after the Seven Years War, forbade the settlement of anymore land west of the crest of the Appalachians. This was a HUGE reason for the discontentment of the colonists. The wealthy colonial land-owners saw this as egregious Royal interference, and used it as a means of churning up rebellion, effectively telling those soldiers who demanded payment, "Look, the king is taking away 'your' land."

[JDPriestly]

5. I think the true story is to be found in the writings of Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, etc.

I would not trust a British version. They taught us to be an empire, a lesson we will pay for dearly.

[Sweeney]

11. No one can take the credit for teaching us to act as idiots.

We thought we were so exceptional that the lessons of history were not meant for us.

[Deertoil]

14. About to say, duplicated here.

And lesson not yet learned.

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

7. The Patriot is shit, historically

For example, the incident where some people are crowded into a church, the doors are locked, and the church set on fire did happen -- in France in 1942.

[DrewFlorida]

8. As is usually the case, the real truth lies somewhere in between the various sides views.

I wouldn't put too much stock in the point of view of the Britts, not anymore than the one sided account we hear in America.
It is interesting to read the various accounts on any historical issue, I'll have to research this subject a bit, sounds interesting.

Thanks for posting!

[Sweeney]

13. The lies told here in regard to the war of 1812 are far worse.

Our capitalists and traders were treasonous in their support of the enemy. In the end it was their pressure that forced the peace for very little gain. It is fortunate the Brits had so long fought Napoleon that they were exhausted, because we were divided, and many of those division were continued right into the Civil War.

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

15. Actually, the War of 1812 was a major mistake

The United States had some quite legitimate grievances against the British. The US sent an ultimatum with a deadline to the Brits, which Lord Palmerston, the foreign secretary, was quite prepared to give a favorable reply to. However, a disappointed office seeker shot and killed the Prime Minister, Spencer Perceval (the only PM to be assassinated, although the IRA did have a try at Margaret Thatcher at least once). Anyway, in the uproar that followed, the deadline for answering the American ultimatum passed, and Congress declared war.

The Brits had no interest in a war with the Americans, since they had their hands full fighting Napoleon, and didn't want to get involved in a sideshow in the US. The Duke of Wellington, who had just successfully concluded a campaign in Spain, was offered the command in America, but turned it down.

[LeftishBrit]

9. Certainly not a mainstream British view nowadays!

The American Revolution doesn't play that big a role in British media, or British school history teaching (indeed the 18th century in general gets less emphasis than some other periods of history); but when it does come up, the attitude is pretty similar to that of the Americans these days. Most Brits nowadays accept that Empire is not desirable, whoever runs it.

[Bucky]

18. I have the feeling British think of America as an old HS sweetheart who got away

It's great that we can sit down for coffee and behave civilly. We really don't think about each other or getting back together that often, even when we're in a lousy relationship, but it's good that we can work together professionally on an important neighbor project, like killing nazis or whatever, when needed.

[Sweeney]

10. We didn't get the revolution we were promised,

but they got the friend they didn't deserve. That is about the size of it.

The English revolution was betrayed by their great general Cromwell as well. They might have had our revolution two hundred years sooner, and been in better shape to conquer the world and hold us to their bosoms. In their case as in ours the goal of the revolution was to recapture the past, and when we have our next revolution it will be once more to capture the Declaration of Independence and the promises of equality and liberty and happiness.

The successful revolutions are driven by the desires of conservative humanity to capture the past. Those who can hold that carrot before their nose have only the goal of capturing and securing the future for themselves and for all. When the future is most in doubt is when people can be motivated to find the best part of the past. Those who see the goal have it already in their grasp. Jefferson saw the goal, and his was a conscious attempt to change a form of government, and this was perhaps the first and finest example of this formal consciousness.

It is so much easier to accomplish a goal when you understand exactly what you are doing, and these revolutionaries did. And in the end it does not matter how well it succeeded, or how badly it was betrayed in the constitution. What matters is: They declared it, and they enforced their declaration, and so all argument to the contrary is moot.

[SheriffBob]

16. bloody british

they are not called the "bloody british" for nothing. Look at their history in india.