The Price of Nationhood: The American Revolution in Charles County

by Jean B. Lee

Book Overview

The American Revolution is seen as a formative event, but it was also a shattering one to those who experienced it. Charles County, situated on the Potomac near Chesapeake Bay, long enjoyed the prosperity of a rich soil and thriving overseas trade. Its social order - white planters at the top, enslaved blacks at the bottom - was stable and its politics were local. This world was swept away by Independence and the war with Britain. Led by its accustomed...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0393036588
• ISBN13: 9780393036589
• Release Date: January 1994
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Length: 388 Pages
• Weight: 1.85 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.5" x 6.4" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Great Understanding of the Colonial Tobacco Coast Culture

I bought this book for genealogical purposes, but found that it was a very enjoyable book to read and explained the culture of the Tobacco Coast to me better than several other books I have read. There was also enough detail that I felt I understood much more of the thought processes of the people I have been tracing and has fleshed out their surroundings in a very complete way.

Excellent Scholarship and Good History

Professor Lee gives us a scholarly review of a microcosm of the culture and weltanshauung of a relatively backwater Maryland county headed into revolution. That such scholarship is targeted at a minor topic is truly impressive. If anything, it gives one pause as to whether the investment in academic research in history is overdone. For here is a representative picture drawn, but at such detail it must have taken tremendous resources. One wonders what topics suffer to give such infinite color to a tiny leaf on a giant tree. But the beauty of scholarship and solid writing for those interested in this topic, such as genealogists or revolutionary war scholars, will find this book a delightfully sharp and detailed portrait of a place whose most might town was the now unremembered "Port Tobacco."