A side quest for an historian who has gotten sucked into Historical Fiction – again. I admit – I wrote the title for this newsletter first, and as a result I am imaging something out of Jasper Fford’s Thursday Next series or out of Kate Quinn’s new book, The Astral Library. And considering that I was just listening to the most recent episode of What Should I Read Next? where Anne and her guest were talking about The Astral Library and the point in the book in which Anne of Green Gables comes up, I’m not really surprised. But I digress. I have been […]
Boston 1776
A Reflection on the 256th Anniversary of the Boston Massacre It is that unhappy anniversary of the Boston Massacre today. Perhaps that is why I found myself picking up Serena Zabin’s The Boston Massacre: A Family History (2020) at the bookshop on Monday. My intent had been to do some digging into the local town history, but while that is still on the top of my to-do list, it is March, and I often find myself coming back here. Why? I can have my guesses. The first being that I spent so much time working just outside […]
Where did Columbus Day come from?
These melting pot moments have a really important place in American history overall. Immigrating a little after, but also around the same time as the Irish, were the Italians. But there was a huge backlash (as there always seems to be) against immigrants in America. “For most of American history, anyone not Anglo-Saxon fell somewhere on a descending scale of human ‘pollution.’ […] … the immigrants arriving from southern and eastern Europe, the ‘scum and offscouring,’ as a former Virginia governor put it, newcomers who purportedly brought crime and disease and polluted the bloodlines of […]
“First of May, sir! Out of the Way!”
It being a fine, bright, mild morning, I got up early, to take a walk on the Battery, the most glorious place for a morning or evening stroll, to be found in the world. Coming down into the entry, I found it cluttered up with a specimen of almost every thing that goes to the composition of house keeping, and three or four sturdy fellows with hand barrows, on which they were piling Ossa upon Pelion. I asked what the matter was, but all I could get out of them was, “First of May, sir—please […]
Astoria and John Jacob Astor
When I set out to start a newsletter about research rabbit holes, the sort of deviation from what I was supposed to be doing research on is sort of what I was thinking of. I see a sentence or two that sends me into a totally different direction than I thought I would be heading. I was reading through The Life and Letters of Washington Irving compiled and annotated by his nephew, Pierre Monroe Irving, when I found the following: For upwards of a month I have been quartered at Hell Gate, with Mr Astor, and I have not […]
Quebec and the American Revolution
Did you know that we invaded Quebec? The Quebecois sure know that we invaded Quebec. They don’t much like us up there. If you’ve ever taken a tour of the Citadel in Quebec City, you would also know this. Our tour guide spent a good long time telling us of all the things that the Quebecois do not like about the British or the Americans. If you spend enough time in Vermont, you’ll also know that we invaded Quebec. When we weren’t invading Quebec, we were thinking about it. And part of that history is […]
Digging the Fortifications on Breed’s Hill
On the 16th day of June, 1775, at night after roll call, I was furnished with a shovel and ordered to march. I was ordered to Bunker Hill, to use my shovel in throwing up a breastwork. I was compelled to labor till daylight. As soon as we were discovered, the British ships and batteries opened a tremendous fire upon us; this they continued till about ten o’clock in the day, when they began to cross Charlestown Ferry. Here they landed their forces and soon after set fire to the town, then formed their troops […]
When Your Great-Grandfather Poses for a Statue
Every year around Patriots’ Day (in Massachusetts), a combination of photo memories and public posts from Minute Man National Historical Park remind us of a story from our family. That story? Our great-grandfather claimed that he had posed for Daniel Chester French for the statue of the minute man that stands at the Old North Bridge. The likelihood that this story is true? Very low. Very, very low. Not entirely impossible. But very unlikely. To read the rest, please click on the link to my Substack below. When Your Great-Grandfather Poses for a Statue
Riding the Hoofbeats of the Early Revolution
Today is 16 April 2025. We are only days away from what would be the opening shots of the American Revolution, 250 years ago this year. Yes, I’ve been banging on about this since, well… Basically since I started this newsletter. 250 years ago this, 250 years ago that. I think you have all been getting the idea by this point. Many of the important anniversaries thus far have been smaller events leading up to this point. Some of them are a bit bigger, such as the Boston Massacre, but we haven’t yet seen any […]
What Happened Yesterday
New Substack Newsletter out now! What Happened Yesterday – by Robin Donovan Bocchiaro