America: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

12/04/2021

Located in the North Wing exhibition of Monticello (Thomas Jefferson’s home from 1770 until his death in 1826) is an exquisite reproduction of Jefferson’s 1802 horse-drawn Phaeton carriage. Thomas Jefferson, being the consummate Renaissance man of his day, dabbled in many inventive, cultural, and scientific passions. These passions included architecture, politics, naturalism, art, fine food, and most relevant to this post, inventing. Jefferson’s carriage pictured above is significant because attached to one of the wheels, Jefferson had affixed an odometer built by Virginia inventor James Clarke. Jefferson first became interested in odometers while in France (1784-1789) serving as a foreign minister for the newly created United States. After several ultimately unfruitful inquiries into odometers in 1788, Jefferson seemed to have tabled the passion for a later time. That time seemed to have arrived in September of 1791, when Jefferson, serving as Secretary of State in Philadelphia, finally purchased an odometer from a local clockmaker named Robert Leslie. By this time, Jefferson had decided that the “Pendulum Odometer” would have made a dependable instrument to establish a standard unit of measure for distance. In Jefferson’s time, pendulum odometers were used on carriages by attaching them between the spokes of one of the carriage’s wheels. On September 2, 1791, Jefferson and James Madison set off from Philadelphia for Montpelier and Monticello, respectively. While it turns out that Jefferson’s measurements of his carriage wheel were off, therefore, throwing off the odometer, Jefferson was nonetheless impressed. In 1807, while Jefferson was president, he wrote the inventor James Clarke about copying a version of his odometer. Clarke was exceedingly pleased with Jefferson’s request and decided to furnish the President with his very own Odometer. An interactive replica of Clark's odometer can be seen in the North Wing exhibition at Monticello today. Jefferson had the odometer augmented with a bell that would chime at each mile much to the ingenious statesman’s delight.

https://www.monticello.org/

Sources:

Harbster, Jennifer, and Julie Miller. “Counting the Miles: Thomas Jefferson's Quest for an Odometer.” The Library of Congress, August 27, 2015. https://blogs.loc.gov/inside_adams/2015/08/counting-the-miles-thomas-jeffersons-quest-for-an-odometer/ #:~:text=To%20calculate%20the%20distance%20a,the%20number%20of%20its%20revolutions.&text=As%20he%20often%20did%2C%20Jefferson,using%20his%20new%20odometer%2C%20distances.

Boonshoft, Mark. “Traveling the Roads of Early America with Jefferson.” The New York Public Library, August 13, 2015. https://www.nypl.org/blog/2015/08/12/traveling-with-jefferson.

10/04/2021

The Bennington Battle Monument is 306 feet 4 and 1/2 inches tall and was completed and dedicated in 1891. It is constructed from blue-grey magnesian limestone.
The Battle of Bennington was fought during the American Revolutionary War and played a pivotal role in the colonist’s victory over British forces. The battle was a part of the Saratoga campaign and was fought on August 16, 1777. The battle was actually fought in Walloomsac, NY which was located roughly 10 miles from Bennington, VT. A rebel force of roughly 2,000 militiamen from Massachusetts and New Hampshire were led by General John Stark, a hero of the Battle of Bunker Hill. This force was reinforced by militiamen from Vermont led by Colonel Seth Warner and Ethan Allen’s Green Mountain Boys. The Battle of Bennington saw the defeat of a force led by Lieutenant Colonel Friedrich Baum who was leading a detachment of General John Burgoyne’s army. In 1777, Burgoyne led an army to the north in order to capture Lake Champlain and the Hudson River valley. The mixed force led by Baum consisted mainly of dragoons (cavalry that entered battle on horseback, but then fought on foot). This force was made up of Canadian, Colonial Loyalist, and Native Forces. Baum had been sent to assault the town of Bennington in the New Hampshire Grants (modern day Vermont) in order to pilfer supplies. Baum and his lieutenants assumed the town to be lightly guarded. However, General Stark and his forces had been stationed at the town unbenounced to Baum. The two forces clashed, and a rainstorm caused both sides into a stalemate. General Stark rallied his troops with the famous words, "There are your enemies, the Red Coats and the Tories. They are ours, or this night Molly Stark sleeps a widow." Soon, Baum’s forces were besieged and after a failed cavalry charge by the Dragoons, Lieutenant Colonel Friedrich Baum was fatally wounded. While Stark’s men were consolidating their victory, Lieutenant Colonel Heinrich von Breymann arrived to reinforce the British forces. The day was feared lost for the Revolutionary forces until Colonel Seth Warner arrived with a detachment of Vermont Militiamen and around 350 members of the Green Mountain Boys led by Lieutenant Samuel Safford. With the help of the reinforcements, victory was snatched from the jaws of defeat for the Revolutionary forces. The battle was significant in degrading Burgoyne’s forces, notably causing his native forces, Burgoyne’s primary reconnaissance force, to abandon the campaign. The British forces, now low on supplies and effectively blind were harassed until eventually surrendering at Saratoga. The loss of Saratoga is widely seen as the turning point of the Revolutionary war and may never have taken place without the Battle of Bennington.
Sources:
Ketchum, Richard M (1997). Saratoga: Turning Point of America's Revolutionary
Gabriel, Michael P. (2012). The Battle of Bennington: Soldiers and Civilians.
Nickerson, Hoffman (1967). The Turning Point of the Revolution.

10/04/2021