Rejects & Revolutionaries (American History Podcast)
112 episodes - English - Latest episode: over 1 year ago - ★★★★★ - 27 ratingsA history of the people who became Americans. Formerly The American History Podcast.
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Episodes
Intelligent Speech 2022
December 12, 2022 21:05 - 42 minutes - 31.1 MBAn audio-only version of my presentation at the 2022 Intelligent Speech Conference. For video, click here! In this presentation, I took a step back to explore the process of settling a new colony, a big-picture discussion of the colonies we've discussed through the lens of 20th Century research on settlement requirements and dynamics. It should surprise no one that a huge factor in success vs. failure deals with psychology and settler mental health, but it is an angle that's been oft o...
Carolina 2: A rude rabble
November 19, 2022 04:48 - 28 minutes - 28.1 MBThe story of Carolina's second settlement attempt was the type of failure we've frequently discussed, but it was also a failure for a new era. English proprietors got distracted, severe supply shortages emerged, and conflict with indigenous tribes ultimately caused the colony to collapse. But, colonists knew what to do, they forcefully made their feelings known, and they were led by people sympathetic to their plight. This meant that a story which, 20 years before, would have left the col...
Carolina 1: Cape Fear
October 29, 2022 04:56 - 28 minutes - 27.8 MBCarolina was a colony for a new era. The Jacobean settlements of Virginia, Bermuda and Plymouth had been tiny, struggling outposts in a very New World. The colonies formed under Charles I (the rest of New England, Barbados, Maryland and others) had been defined by the political and religious turbulence of his reign. Now, a revolution had come and gone, an empire had been born, and it was time for the next era of English colonial expansion. Because of all of this, settling Carolina would ...
Restoration 12: The fall of Panama and rise of Jamaica
September 28, 2022 11:52 - 38 minutes - 37 MBHenry Morgan's privateering exploits had turned to full on piracy by the time he attacked Maracaibo and, especially, Panama City. Still, he enjoyed the support of the island's population and leadership, and the money he brought to the colony facilitated its transformation into one of England's wealthiest colonies. Website (transcripts) Patreon Buy Me a Coffee Twitter
Restoration 11: Rumors of colonial independence
July 16, 2022 05:29 - 45 minutes - 38.5 MBAfter the Willoughby brothers, the king imposed governors in Barbados who he expected to be loyal to him instead of the colony. The first two backfired in dramatically different ways, one siding with the colonists, and the other descending into embarrasing levels of tyranny and corruption. Website (transcripts)
Restoration 10: Boys, you gotta learn not to talk to kings that way
June 07, 2022 04:58 - 27 minutes - 19.8 MBNeither the king nor Barbados was willing to budge over the financial issues surrounding the Second Anglo-Dutch War, and what ensued was the biggest showdown between king and colony in American history. Website (transcripts, sources, etc) Patreon or BMAC Intelligent Speech is coming!
Restoration 9: War and pieces of eight
May 26, 2022 07:29 - 30 minutes - 23.4 MBHenry Morgan's piratical exploits during the Second Anglo-Dutch War took him into combat not with England's allies, but rather against the Spanish of Cuba and Panama. Website (transcripts) Intelligent Speech Conference information!
Restoration 8: Barbados, betrayed
May 21, 2022 07:10 - 29 minutes - 22.9 MBBarbados would never really recover from the Second Anglo-Dutch War. Compared to islands like St. Kitts, it had gotten through the conflict without too much damage, but it had still funded and fought a full theater of war almost alone, and when the war was over, the demands and impositions (not least, the Navigation Acts finally being fully enforced) just kept coming. This pushed the colony to the point of irreconcilable hostility to England, its king, and its governor. Colonists unite...
Intelligent Speech 2022 - June 25
May 07, 2022 05:01 - 3 minutes - 1.65 MBInformation about this year's Intelligent Speech Conference! 35 presentations in four virtual rooms bringing together the independent educational podcast community. This year's theme: Crossings Date: June 25, 2022 Place: Your home, via Zoom Tickets: $20 before June 1. 10% off with promo code RnR. Standard price $30. Learn more: https://intelligentspeechconference.com
Restoration 7: Barbados, alone
May 07, 2022 02:49 - 35 minutes - 19.4 MBThe First Anglo-Dutch War hit Barbados hard. After a 10 hour battle expended all their ammunition, colonists and king bickered over who should be responsible for buying more. Ultimately, the compromise was to put off the issue by loaning the king the money, and for two years, Barbados defended England's Caribbean holdings, spending 100,000 pounds, recruiting thousands of soldiers, facing severe food shortages, and ultimately losing its governor in a hurricane. It would never recover. Fin...
Restoration 5: No peace beyond the line
April 20, 2022 05:00 - 33 minutes - 25.9 MBIf you enjoy this show, would you please rate/review on whatever podcast app you use? Thank you! As Jamaica limped along after the Western Design, escaped slaves maintained their own colony in the island's central mountains, and pirates controlled Port Royal. From 1661-64, Jamaica had a series of governors, one of whom lasted only 10 weeks in the role. Modiford's defeat in Barbados, though, sent him to Jamaica and in Jamaica he began to make his mark. He quashed all democratic govern...
Restoration 6: No peace beyond the line
April 20, 2022 05:00 - 33 minutes - 25.9 MBIf you enjoy this show, would you please rate/review on whatever podcast app you use? Thank you! As Jamaica limped along after the Western Design, escaped slaves maintained their own colony in the island's central mountains, and pirates controlled Port Royal. From 1661-64, Jamaica had a series of governors, one of whom lasted only 10 weeks in the role. Modiford's defeat in Barbados, though, sent him to Jamaica and in Jamaica he began to make his mark. He quashed all democratic governan...
Barbados in the Restoration
April 08, 2022 02:12 - 37 minutes - 22.7 MBWhen the Restoration happened, Barbados requested to be made a crown colony, thinking its rights would be better protected. In return for giving up his proprietary rights, Willoughby was made Barbados's first royal governor. Suddenly, Barbadians were faced with the first real imposition to their self-government in well over a decade, and the conflict frustrated both Willoughby and the colonists. Meanwhile, an illegal slave deal with the Spanish ultimately gives Barbados the right to sell ...
Restoration 4: Meet the new boss
March 22, 2022 06:04 - 38 minutes - 32.7 MBCharles II kept a stronger Parliament within England than his father could have imagined, and he expanded the Navigation Acts, kept the policy of transportation, and pushed the slave trade. When news of the new king's planned policies reached Virginia, Berkeley rushed to ask that they be revoked or modified to avoid crushing his colony. Website & transcripts Patreon Buy Me A Coffee
Restoration 3: Fendall's Rebellion
March 03, 2022 06:50 - 22 minutes - 22.5 MBA political fight in Maryland highlights the colony's new state of affairs - Lord Baltimore may own the colony, but he has virtually no power there. Find transcripts and more on the website Support this podcast on Patreon Buy me a Coffee for one-time donations
Restoration 2: Hopes of paradise lost
February 17, 2022 06:04 - 39 minutes - 33.6 MBAfter the Restoration prompted a bloody revolt by Thomas Venner's Fifth Monarchist group in London, Charles II cast a wary eye on New England. Meanwhile, regicides Whalley and Goffe had escaped punishment in England to make their home in Massachusetts. The fallout would lead to the end of New Haven as a colony. Website & Transcripts: Americanhistorypodcast.net Patreon BuyMeACoffee
Restoration 1: America in 1660
January 28, 2022 05:43 - 35 minutes - 17.8 MBA quick recap of everything that's changed in America during the period of the English Civil Wars and Interregnum/Commonwealth, as well as problems colonists are facing going into the reign of King Charles II. By the way, I've got a patreon (for ongoing support) and Buy Me a Coffee (easier for one-time donations) now, so if you're interested in helping support the show, the links are below! https://www.patreon.com/RNRPod https://www.buymeacoffee.com/RNRPod
ECW 32: The Restoration
January 13, 2022 18:01 - 32 minutes - 22.5 MBIn the final episode of our English Civil War series, we discuss the Restoration. After Cromwell died, there was chaos that could have erupted in yet another round of war. Instead, though, the return of Charles II to the throne of England occurred without bloodshed, which only intensified the excitement over his return. With the exception of most New England colonies, to, colonists were overjoyed to see the return of the king. With the Restoration, they could hope to reverse the hated...
ECW 31: Frustrations in Rhode Island
December 31, 2021 07:35 - 30 minutes - 32.1 MBWhile New England's comfort generally increased in the Cromwell years, Rhode Island suffered from a lagging economy, political divisions and even issues with religious dissidents who worked to destabilize the already unstable colony. Plymouth's prosperity also waned as trade came to dominate the New England economy. And in the United Colonies, the issue of infant baptism continued to create problems. In response to the limits of Church-membership exclusivity (including but not limited t...
ECW 30: How long is this Cromwell thing going to last, anyway?
December 09, 2021 14:41 - 32 minutes - 28.6 MBCromwell decides in favor of Baltimore's proprietorship in Maryland, Virginia works to subvert English puritan leadership and reinstall a royalist government, Bermuda has its first slave revolt, and Barbados foreshadows Revolutionary War sentiments by opposing taxation without representation.
ECW 29: The Western Design
November 25, 2021 03:00 - 43 minutes - 28.3 MBThe Western Design was supposed to be England's plan to conquer Spanish America, starting with Hispaniola, Puerto Rico, Cuba and Cartagena (Colombia). Instead, after a disastrous expedition, England had ended up with Jamaica. For a while, owning Jamaica was disastrous in and of itself. Tens of thousands of people died, a huge percent of them Irish victims of transportation.
ECW 28: Mary Dyer & the early Quakers
November 10, 2021 06:00 - 44 minutes - 42.2 MBFormer Anne Hutchinson disciple Mary Dyer was the third of four Quakers to be executed in New England. Persecution of Quakers was rampant across the English speaking world, ranging from imprisonment in Suriname to whipping in the Chesapeake to executions in New England. In England, itself, by 1655, they were dubbed the greatest threat left to England's future. But why? (This episode is a little bit more inappropriate than most. I wouldn't say it's explicit, exactly, but various in...
ECW 27: Witch trials in the Devils Isles
October 27, 2021 05:01America's history of witch executions started 40 years before the Salem Witch Trials. Its first victim was Connecticut's Alse Young in 1647. Soon, Massachusetts had joined in the practice, as had Bermuda. Devastated Bermuda and legally-dubious Connecticut saw the largest numbers of witch trials in these years, and we examine how that came to be. Featuring a random elk that bugled outside my window as I was recording.
ECW 27: Witch trials in the Devils Isles
October 27, 2021 05:01America's history of witch executions started 40 years before the Salem Witch Trials. Its first victim was Connecticut's Alse Young in 1647. Soon, Massachusetts had joined in the practice, as had Bermuda. Devastated Bermuda and legally-dubious Connecticut saw the largest numbers of witch trials in these years, and we examine how that came to be. Featuring a random elk that bugled outside my window as I was recording.
ECW 26: Maine
October 14, 2021 05:00A brief history of the Province of Maine, culminating in its takeover by Massachusetts Bay in 1652/3.
ECW 26: Maine
October 14, 2021 05:00 - 41 minutes - 37.6 MBA brief history of the Province of Maine, culminating in its takeover by Massachusetts Bay in 1652/3.
ECW 25: The Guinea Company
September 30, 2021 12:09England's participation in the Western African trade started very slowly, and the slave trade was explicitly rejected by early English traders to Africa. Still, within 40 years, English participation in the slave trade became common, and England's most valuable colony (Barbados) had shifted to slavery as a labor source. This episode looks at the history of that trade, as well as nuances of the history of the adoption of slavery in Virginia.
ECW 25: The Guinea Company
September 30, 2021 12:09England's participation in the Western African trade started very slowly, and the slave trade was explicitly rejected by early English traders to Africa. Still, within 40 years, English participation in the slave trade became common, and England's most valuable colony (Barbados) had shifted to slavery as a labor source. This episode looks at the history of that trade, as well as nuances of the history of the adoption of slavery in Virginia.
ECW 24: The Battle of the Severn
September 15, 2021 16:42 - 39 minutes - 37.3 MBBennett and Claiborne had control of Virginia, and two weeks later they went to Maryland to demand it renounce its loyalty to Lord Baltimore. When Marylanders refused, they took over the colony's government. Baltimore ordered his governor to fight to maintain the colony's government (and therefore, its stance of toleration toward Catholics), and this fight culminated in a bloody fight involving nearly 400 colonists. This came to be known as the Battle of the Severn.
ECW 23: Empire
September 02, 2021 17:31 - 36 minutes - 36 MBEngland moves to suppress the colonies which declared allegiance to King Charles II over the Commonwealth. The battle reaches its climax in Barbados, with a three month siege and potential battle between armies of thousands. After suppression, though, it passes the Navigation Act of 1651, declaring that all English colonies must trade only with English ships. With this, the foundations of the British Empire were laid.
ECW 22: The English Invasion of Scotland
August 19, 2021 00:27 - 23 minutes - 21.2 MBThe execution of Charles I led to one last wave of war in England and Scotland, dubbed the Third English Civil War, and the English Invasion of Scotland. England's victory left them in control of Scotland, with a military government led by George Monck. It also led to thousands of POWs being transported to England's American (and African) colonies as unwilling indentured servants. These people would never return to Scotland, but instead form the original group of Scottish settlers in A...
ECW 21: The Scottish Civil War pt. 1
August 19, 2021 00:16 - 27 minutes - 21.5 MBIn part one of a two part episode on the British Civil Wars in Scotland, we discuss the early events of the war. The unlikely Royalist conquest of Scotland under James Graham, Marquess of Montrose, and Alasdair MacColla has made Montrose one of the most romanticized figures of Scottish history. After the surrender of the king, Hamilton (not that one) led the creation of the Engagement Party to ally with the King against Cromwell's Independents, but the movement ended in catastrophe - th...
ECW 20: Scotland's Civil War
August 04, 2021 08:19 - 29 minutes - 28.6 MBAn overview of the situation in Scotland leading into 1643, with a brief history of the origins of the Ulster Plantation and Scots Irish.
ECW 19: The challenges and rewards of victory
July 21, 2021 18:22 - 24 minutes - 21.6 MBThe United Colonies of New England enjoy unprecedented peace and prosperity in the years following Cromwell's rise to power, and Cotton encourages ordinary people that the regicide was part of God's plan to bring about the millennium. Pardon the roughness of this episode. Still re-getting my sea legs, while adjusting to a new computer and recording space. And thank you for being patient!
ECW 18: Declarations of Independence
July 30, 2020 07:09 - 38 minutes - 23.2 MBIn response to the execution of King Charles I, the colonies of Bermuda, Virginia, Maryland, Newfoundland, Antigua and Barbados declared their allegiance to his uncrowned and exiled heir. In doing so, they declared their separation from the English government. Some even went so far as to arm and defend themselves to defend this separation.
ECW 17: The Second English Civil War
July 15, 2020 05:00 - 50 minutes - 32.2 MBBack in England, the King had surrendered to the Scots at Newcastle, but the victorious Parliamentarians were divided. Presbyterians versus Independents, Parliament versus the Army. Discontent in the countryside turned into unrest, and the failure of either side to successfully negotiate with the King led to round two of war. At the end of this war, Parliament was ready to finalize negotiations, but the Army had other ideas. Pride's Purge settled the question of whether Parliament or the...
ECW 16: The Cambridge Platform
July 01, 2020 07:00 - 25 minutes - 16.4 MBIn the aftermath of the Remonstrance of 1646, two things happen. One, Massachusetts deputies and magistrates stay united long enough to implement watered down versions of some of the reforms the deputies had been pushing for all along. Second, though, New England set about to declare to the world what the Congregational way to govern a Church was (and by this, I do mean the United Colonies, everyone except Rhode Island). By rejecting both Presbyterianism (which was too hierarchical, a...
ECW 15: The Toleration Act
June 24, 2020 13:43 - 23 minutes - 21.1 MBFollowing the Plundering Time, Maryland needed to re-evaluate its trajectory and the extent to which maintaining its original vision was feasible in the aftermath of the First English Civil War. While the colony worked to stabilize itself internally, Baltimore prepared a rebranding and reset of his colony, replacing Catholic leadership with Puritan, but also implementing a series of measures to ensure continued toleration of religious minorities. The most famous of these was the Toleration...
ECW 14: Common Prayer
June 17, 2020 07:00 - 22 minutes - 15.4 MBIn 1645, Parliament abolished the English Book of Common Prayer, and in response, Virginia strengthened its laws requiring ministers to use it. By 1648, tension surrounding the Prayer Book caused two more puritan leaders to be kicked out of Virginia, and this left the rest of the colony's puritans wondering whether they should stay.
ECW 13: A new colony, and an end to neutrality
June 10, 2020 07:00 - 31 minutes - 21.2 MBIn this episode, we look at what happens at the end of the First English War in Bermuda and Barbados. A new colony emerges, and Barbados's neutral days are numbered as the end of war brings threats to the status quo from both sides.
ECW 12: The experience of war in England
August 07, 2019 12:29 - 33 minutes - 25.9 MBA quick episode back in England, discussing the polarizing experience of war, which drove thousands of new immigrants to the colonies, and also created a seriously different mindset between new colonists and old ones.
ECW 11: The Remonstrance of 1646, pt. 2
July 24, 2019 13:51 - 22 minutes - 22.2 MBThe biggest threat yet to Massachusetts Bay autonomy also provoked some of its most ruthless political suppression. But, the colony wins, the deputies and magistrates unite, a new synod of New England Churches is planned, and if anything, the region's status quo is strengthened. Plus, Plymouth's Edward Winslow goes back to England to advocate on Massachusetts's behalf, and becomes increasingly involved in Parliamentary governance.
ECW 10: Reform, autonomy and the Remonstrance of 1646
July 17, 2019 13:09 - 38 minutes - 27.9 MBWhen Parliament allows Samuel Gorton to appeal decisions made by the Massachusetts General Court, a small group of disgruntled New Englanders gets together to push for reform in Massachusetts, in a way which threatens the autonomy the colony has always valued so much.
ECW 9: Polarization, moderation and the end of the first Civil War
June 19, 2019 13:19 - 39 minutes - 27.4 MBBermuda Presbyterians beg for an anti-Congregationalist governor, and when they get him, retaliation pushes Congregationalists to England, where they become a focal point of the debate between Presbyterians and Independents. Barbados maintains its neutrality, despite repeated attempts by Parliament to push it to declare its allegiance.
English Civil War 8: Long awaited return
June 07, 2019 15:21 - 40 minutes - 30 MBBerkeley returns from England to find the Powhatan War mismanaged. Calvert returns from Virginia to reinstate Maryland's Proprietary government. But ... the last remaining Royalist port, Bristol, falls, an event which spells trouble for all American colonies, not just Royalist ones. Also, Opechancanough is murdered.
English Civil War 7: The Plundering Time
April 17, 2019 10:41 - 35 minutes - 26.1 MBRichard Ingle returns to Maryland to lead a revolt which topples Maryland's Catholic leadership, and steals everything they own. Fathers White and Copley return to England as prisoners, and Calvert escapes to Virginia.
English Civil War 6: War comes to America
April 10, 2019 19:09 - 29 minutes - 18.8 MBCongregationalists seize control of Bermuda's government and Church, imposing an era of oppression of the colony's Royalists/Anglicans and Presbyterians. The Third Anglo-Powhatan War begins, and William Claiborne and Richard Ingle join forces for an attack on Maryland. Plus, we briefly discuss the life of Thomas Rolfe, son of Pocahontas and John Rolfe.
English Civil War 5: the Hingham Militia Case
April 04, 2019 20:05 - 44 minutes - 26.4 MBDeputies clash with magistrates and Presbyterians with Congregationalists, resulting in Massachusetts's most heated political battle since 1636, and leading John Winthrop to give his famous "Little Speech on Liberty."
ECW 4: The worst and most dangerous times (and sugar!)
March 27, 2019 08:03 - 35 minutes - 25.4 MBANNOUNCEMENT: I'm planning to change the name of this podcast, either to "American Origins" or "Rejects & Revolutionaries." Richard Ingle is arrested for treason in Maryland, Virginia starts kicking out Puritans, Barbados takes a unique approach to avoiding factional conflict, and Barbados colonist James Drax asks the Dutch for help cultivating sugar.
English Civil War 3: Aristocracy vs. Democracy
March 20, 2019 20:18 - 44 minutes - 40.8 MBIn 1643, the debate between the deputies and the magistrates intensified in Massachusetts, and puritans in both old and New England debated the merits of Presbyterianism and Congregationalism. The fundamental issue underlying both controversies was how far the revolution should go. Should England retain an aristocratic hierarchy, or move toward democracy?