Everyone has different opinions about the Declaration of Independence just as …
they have different opinions about people’s roles during the American Revolution. This has to do with two things:
(1) the United States is trying to grow more diverse in all people’s history during the American Revolution and
(2) the history of the American Revolution is sometimes told in a one-dimensional scale, i.e. the story of how white men fought.
I know there are stories told of African Americans who fought and earned freedom as Patriots or as Loyalists.
We still limit how much of the story we tell.
Just as the Declaration of Independence still has “all men” instead of “all people.”
Yes, I’m that girl.
The main character in the awesome, alternate history/ Dystopian YA novel, Live in Infamy by Caroline Tung Richmond observes the US has mistakes in its history, but it has also provided the opportunity for the American culture to change. Its protagonist updates parts from the Declaration of Independence, which has been banned by its Imperial Japanese and Nazi overlords. (Read it.) He writes the “all people” part in; something I’ve thought of for a long time.
In my poetry memoir, Tall Tales of Luska Road and Other Forgotten Carolina Towns (changed the title again), I write about several towns where I had worked as a reporter. These towns had strong ties to the American Revolution. While some people where I come from fell for the old Civil War attachment, I learned a lot about the American Revolution. I mean, it was kind of more the Carolinas’ thing than that other war.
When I wrote a poem, my Mom said, “You’ve always loved the Revolutionary War. I’d take you to the state park, and we’d get the paper dolls of Molly Pitcher.” That’s right, women heroes. I found a lot of women to admire during the American Revolution who disguised themselves as men, served as nurses, or as spies.
So, why even in my state’s history book that I use to teach, is Betsy Ross still our only American Revolutionary heroine in 2019?
Okay, props to our girl. She made one of the first American flags and sought to serve her nation just like my girl, Louisa May Alcott, served as a Union Army nurse. (Yes, that made me popular growing up that I loved Little Women and believed in the March family’s anti-child labor beliefs.)
Just as we need to discuss more of the roles of Native Americans and African Americans more widely in the American Revolution story, we need to tell the story of the women who believed in an independent United States.
Dedicated to my childhood obsession of Molly Pitcher and the women who inspired her myth.
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