On June 1, 1866, one thousand heavily-armed Irish-American Fenian insurgents invaded Upper Canada across the Niagara River from Buffalo, NY. The next day near the town of Ridgeway, 800 Fenians battled with 850 Canadian volunteer soldiers, including a small company of 28 University of Toronto students who ended up taking the brunt of the attack. The Battle of Ridgeway (or Lime Ridge or Limestone Ridge) ended with a disastrous rout of the Canadians who in their panicked retreat left their dead and wounded on the field. It was the last major incursion into Canada, the last battle in Ontario and the first modern one fought by Canadians, led in the field exclusively by Canadian officers, and significantly fought in Canada. The Fenian Raid mobilized some 22,000 volunteer troops and resulted in the suspension of habeas corpus in the colonial Province of Canada by its Attorney General and Minister of Militia John A. Macdonald, but the battle which climaxed this crisis is only prominent by its obscurity in Canadian historiography. Almost everything known and cited about Ridgeway springs from the same sources—four books and pamphlets—three of them published in the summer of 1866 immediately after the event and the remaining one in 1910. This dissertation argues that the history of the battle was distorted and falsified by these sources and by two military board of inquiries staged to explicitly cover up the extent of the disaster. This study investigates the relationship between the inquiries and the contemporary author-historians of two of the sources: Alexander Somerville, an investigative journalist in Hamilton, Ontario, a recent immigrant from Britain with a controversial history; and George T. Denison III, a prominent young Toronto attorney, a commander of a troop of volunteer cavalry, a former Confederate secret service agent, author-commentator on Canada’s military policy and presiding judge on both boards of inquiry. This study describes the process by which Ridgeway’s history was hidden and falsified and its possible scope and significance in Canadian historiography. New archival and published sources are identified, assessed and assembled for a newly restored and authenticated micro-narrative of the battle.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Washington State University, August 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 244-257).

The story of the rural soldiers and militiamen of Virginia that served in the American Revolution remains open to historical research and exploration. Recent scholarship of Virginia’s military contribution to the Revolution focuses heavily on relationships of power among social groups that operated within the colony’s hierarchy, concluding that a lack of white, lower-class political and economic representation disabled mobilization among the Old Dominion’s more settled regions. My study emphasizes the revolutionary backcountry’s story by using Fauquier County, Virginia as a case study. A study of Rural Virginia during the Revolution presents scholars with significant challenges. Literacy rates among the general population were meager, meaning that Virginians in the backcountry left few letters and diaries for historians to interpret. Further complicating the reconstruction of Virginia’s rural revolutionary past were the destructive events of the nineteenth century. The tumults of the Civil War destroyed many Revolutionary War records of several Virginia counties, erasing much of what the Old Dominion’s revolutionary generation documented. For these reasons, Fauquier County represents an ideal subject of study. Court minutes, tax records, property records, and even a few letters and diary entries survived history’s fires to provide enough data from which to synthesize a social history to explore rural Virginia’s revolutionary story and mobilization patterns. The revolutionaries in Fauquier County were not always in concert with those throughout the rest of the colony. In contrast to most of Virginia, the county rallied enthusiastically to pre-Declaration calls for companies of minutemen. Hundreds of rural farmers from Fauquier across the socioeconomic spectrum served in the most successful of Virginia’s fleeting minute battalions known as the Culpeper Minutemen. These men defined themselves as backcountry Virginians against their more cosmopolitan peers from the longer-established eastern settlements. As the war matured and exacted its toll, however, fault lines between the local gentry and local yeomen widened, and the county settled into a recruiting pattern like most other Revolutionary Virginian counties. Understanding the issue of representation and its effect on how communities respond to a crisis remains a highly relevant topic that continues to challenge the public and its elected representatives to this day.

Research into the background of the Second Amendment is hampered by its relationship to the current highly emotional debate over gun control. Many otherwise useful secondary sources either ignore the issue completely or give accounts which reflect the controversies of the twentieth century rather than those of the eighteenth. Fortunately, however, the Americans of the revolutionary era wrote extensively about the subject. With independence, the Americans were faced with the problem of organizing and controlling a defense establishment. The new nation was virtually defenseless: the Continental Army was disbanded and the militia, after years of neglect, emasculated. During the decade following the War for Independence, many unsuccessful attempts were made to revitalize the militia and thus prevent the establishment of a professional army. With the adoption of the Constitution in 1787, military affairs reached a turning point. The central government was granted almost unlimited power to rise a standing army without any firm mandate to reform the militia. In an attempt to prevent this and assure that the people would continue to control the military power of the nation, the Second Amendment was adopted as a part of the Bill of Rights.

Objective: To enable primarily public libraries and secondarily public health workers and rural hospital staff to be consumer health information providers with the goal of creating a program that could be copied nationally, enabling public library workers to become an important resource in reversing our national health information illiteracy. Setting: Three regions of the state regional public library system covering seventeen counties and two regions of the state public health department system. Participants: Public library staff, public health department staff, and rural hospital staff. Program: East Tennessee State University (ETSU) College of Medicine Library partnered with public libraries to improve the delivery of health information. Four free classes were taught multiple times: “Prescription for Success,” “An Apple a Day,” “PubMed for Public Librarians,” and “From Snake Oil to Penicillin.” Regional public library directors were used to convince their staff of its value and obtain the concurrence of their boards for release time for class attendance. Classes were also developed for the public health workforce and rural hospital staff. Existing classes (with all teaching materials on the National Network of Libraries of Medicine [NN/ LM] Website) were used with the existing public library system. Results: Five-hundred thirty-three students attended the classes. Fifty-two public library workers received MLA’s Consumer Health Information Specialist certification. Thirty-one public libraries have joined NN/LM. All ordered MedlinePlus marketing materials for their libraries from InformationRx.org. Conclusion: This project helped address the public health problem of health information illiteracy by filling the gap the average person has in finding quality health information. A strength of this project is its easy replication. The project used materials that were readily available and put them to use. Any library could replicate this project in its own service area saving time and cost to the library.

No description available.

During the Revolutionary War, many key Patriot leaders believed that militia were untrustworthy and useless in battle. After the American victory, many of the same men proclaimed their support for the militia as the foundation of the new nation's defense. The debate on the efficacy of Patriot militia continues into modern scholarship; some historians credit the militia with an important strategic role in the war, while others consider them a mere footnote in a conflict that was truly won by the Continental Army. This series of case studies examines four American expeditionary militia units to assess their level of military competence and professionalism. The results show that militia units were far from amateur, and many conducted their operations in a professional military manner. This supports a conclusion that militia both contributed to the American victory and remained a practical means of defense for the young nation.

Following the Treaty of Paris, which formally ended the American Revolution, the United States faced the daunting task of transitioning from an alliance of rebellious colonies to a unified republican government. From the outset the United States struggled to integrate their revolutionary ideology into a functional system of governance. The country’s national defense establishment typified this struggle. Professional armies, eighteenth-century Americans believed, remained antithetical to republican principles. Such forces, they believed, were the tools authoritarian leaders wielded to promote tyranny and suppress individual liberties. Their ranks were filled with aristocratic officers and mindless mercenary soldiers drawn from the lowest rungs of society. To preserve their revolutionary ideals, the young nation chose to place their national defense in the hands of local militias. Filled with citizen-soldiers, militias provided security while avoiding the evils of professional armies.The nation’s militia system following the revolution, however, remained in disarray. Based in local communities across the nation, the militia remained poorly organized, ill-equipped, and poorly trained. Local citizens, state and federal policymakers, and military officials remained committed to fixing the only military system compatible with their idealized republican society. In the first decade following the adoption of the U.S. Constitution, the federal and state governments passed waves of legislation to try and reform the militia system. Despite these efforts, the militia, by the end of the federalist era, remained poorly organized, ill-equipped, and, in a single defining word, ineffective. The limited scholarly attention devoted to examining the militia during this period centers on the national political debate amongst elite politicians and the legislation they drafted to improve the militia. Such debates reveal how republican ideology, the same ideology which necessitated the militia, imposed constraints on the system. Historians, however, often remain less focused on actual militia organizations. Examining local militias illuminates the impact these republican constraints placed on the system. Exploring the thoughts and actions of local militiamen also reveals they too embraced republican principles. Their unique equalitarian conception of republicanism, however, contrasted with the conception most policymakers held. Militiamen resisted the militia system policymakers imposed, deeming it incompatible with true republican principles. Well-crafted legislation mattered little if militiamen refused to enact the system policymakers set forth. Instead of compromising, policymakers tried to rein in the unruly militias. These efforts provoked more resistance. Exhausted after years of failed reform, the government increasingly turned to the least republican option of all: a professional standing army. / History

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-27T17:27:03Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Walter Franco Lopes da Silva.pdf: 770269 bytes, checksum: 32cbb8339d0a59df2acaebe6579bdc90 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-11-09 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / This research aims at addressing Machiavelli s I primi scritti politici written during the philosopher s fourteen years of involvement in politics, social conflicts and military events as Secretary to the Florentine Republic s Second Chancellery, as well as when working as Secretary to the dei Dieci di Libertà e Balía. Central to this investigation is the understanding of I primi scritti politici as an important group of writings whose fundamental nature is to bring about new debates in the fields of politics, war and social conflicts within the Florentine Republic from the early XVI Century. In addition to that, this investigation aims at considerate I primi scritti politici as the launching of Machiavelli process of thinking. Accordingly, one intends to comprehend this philosopher s process of thinking in relation to the fields of diplomacy, war and politics when in charge of a quite specific position within the Government of the Florentine Republic. Furthermore, in order to comprehend Machiavelli s infant process of thinking as a philosopher, one needs to position it within both the Florentine Government s administrative and power structures. Since this research addresses Machiavelli thinking in the fields of political and military powers in the context of the Florentine Republic, it was taken into consideration that the thinking itself reflects on a theoretical level the presumed attempt to put together the Chancellery s political-administrative and written praxis within an historical context of Florence from the years of 1489-1512. Notwithstanding this, the understanding of such philosophical thought from a historical perspective demands the comprehension of the philosopher s own universality of thinking not bind to the so-called spread of rudimentary political realism so present at that time. By the reading of I primi scritti politici, in addition to a reflexion about his experience in the Florentine Chancellery, one may comprehend the reasons behind the defence of the militia project and the consequential debate about the maintenance of freedom in Florence. Therefore, through the reconstruction of the precise political and military context - as well as logistical, legal and theoretical difficulties existent - one can understand the hardships encountered by this thinker. Hence, one shall argue that Machiavelli s experience as Secretary offered him backgrounds needed to bring about a strategy to put into place the militia project in line with the broader need to maintain freedom. By backing a military power financed and supported by Florence, Machiavelli brought a larger political project into the arena, focused on State defence and territorial administration backed on the removal of the mercenary forces from the Florentine scene. These ideas can be found on the philosopher s later works on politics, war and defence in his / Este trabalho trata de I primi scritti politici de Nicolau Maquiavel (1469 1527) redigidos durante os catorze anos em que esteve envolvido nas políticas, nos conflitos e nas guerras de seu tempo, exercendo suas atividades como Segretario da Segunda Chancelaria e como Segretario dos Dez da Liberdade da República Florentina a partir de 1498. Nesta dissertação adotam-se alguns pressupostos necessários para lançar mais uma luz sobre o início e o processo de amadurecimento do pensamento maquiaveliano a partir de I primi scritti politici. Assim, busca-se a compreensão e seu pensamento a respeito da diplomacia, da guerra e da política a partir de uma experiência de governo muito específica. Para se compreender o início do discurso maquiaveliano, portanto, exige-se o seu emparelhamento face à experiência de governo de Maquiavel Segretario então inserido na estrutura administrativa e de poder da República Florentina. Isto porque, seria através de uma aproximação de alguns elementos da teoria político-militar maquiavelinana com a práxis político-administrativa e de escrita da Chancelaria que se torna possível, em muitos de seus aspectos, a reconstrução da obra face ao contexto de sua época. Contudo busca-se esta compreensão segundo um contexto de época, sem prender o autor ao realismo político rudimentar ainda muito difundido em seu tempo ou mesmo, perder de vista a universalidade de seu pensamento. I primi scritti politici oferecem um relato único das preocupações do governo florentino com sua integridade territorial, de como lidar com as questões da liberdade e da autonomia ou não de seus domínios territoriais e, não menos importante, dos temas que vêm a ser objeto deste estudo: a querra, o papel desempenhado pelos condottieri, a sua defesa da formação de uma milícia própria e o jogo de poder político muito característico da República Florentina do período. Assim, a partir da leitura dos scritti e reflexão a respeito da sua experiência na Chancelaria, compreendem-se as razões da defesa da constituição de uma milícia da Ordenança, paralelamente ao fundamental problema da manutenção e das garantias das liberdades na Florença de então. Investiga-se se Maquiavel Segretario entre 1498 a 1512 compreendia o estabelecimento da milícia da Ordenança Florentina como parte de uma estratégia político-administrativa maior do território florentino (e de seus domínios) e na qual o estabelecimento de um exército próprio não mercenário impunha-se. O discurso maquiaveliano não apenas analisa os pressupostos necessários para o estabelecimento de forças próprias militares, mas, também, os meios necessários para a sua gestão com todas suas implicações, valiosa experiência para o processo de amadurecimento do autor e que permearia suas obras posteriores

With the election of President Barack Obama, the United States has seen a steady increase in the number of right-wing militia groups. The Southern Poverty Law Center and the Department of Homeland Security have claimed that the various militia groups are a dangerous domestic terrorism threat. Law enforcement perceptions of the threat that these militia groups pose served as the focus of inquiry in this multiple case study. These perceptions were explored through the theoretical frameworks of groupthink, Credulous Bayesianism, and nudge theory. A purposeful sample of 12 local sheriffs in Texas were interviewed in an attempt to identify common themes regarding their perceptions of militia groups. Two common themes emerged from the interviews, which showed that sheriffs' firsthand knowledge and experience with members of the militia were instrumental in their approach to militias. If sheriffs had direct contact with the militia, then they did not believe that it posed a threat to society. However, if sheriffs did not have firsthand experience with the militia and depended on the media for their opinions, then they followed the narrative that the militia groups are dangerous. This research project showed that sheriffs' direct interaction with the militia can decrease law enforcement's fear of militia groups, allowing sheriffs to detect, investigate, and prosecute any actual threats from militia groups to make their communities safer while protecting the rights of all citizens.