User talk:Kevin Myers/Archive 1

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Contents 1 1812 2 history articles on wikipedia? 3 Numbers of blacks fighting-- Loyalist v. Patriot 4 It's Your Misfortune 5 The Kevin Myers? 6 Continental Army 7 Template:Campaignbox American Revolutionary War: Boston 8 Template:Campaignbox American Revolutionary War 9 Opposition to the War of 1812

[edit] 1812

Thanks Kevin for your update! Very interesting. Any idea where the bounders that John Quincy Adams was complaining about get these (presumably American) slaves that they liberated? --Daedelus 18:29, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Yes -- Alexander Cochrane issued appeals to American slaves to runaway and join the British cause, and many did so, and served as marines and such for the Royal Navy. This was essentially the same tactic used by the British in the American Revolutionary War, particularly in Virginia by Lord Dunmore. In the earlier conflict it was less ideology and more military necessity, I think. This time, with the Royal Navy emerging as the "world police" against the slave trade on the high seas, humanitarian ideology was now more of a factor. In both wars, American slave owners protested loudly, of course.

This topic should be covered in the War of 1812 article, and I hope you continue working on it! --Kevin Myers 19:30, Feb 8, 2005 (UTC)

Kevin: Great additions to the War of 1812 article! I've added a note on the talk page about condensing the article somewhat. That seems to me to be a good next step in the cleanup process. What do you think? Sunray 16:43, 2005 Mar 17 (UTC)

Thanks! I agree with your outline. The article American Revolutionary War was condensed by describing important battles in only one or two sentences. Even the ultimate Battle of Yorktown gets only two sentences, I believe. Readers who want more can click on the battle to get more details. The same approach should be taken with the War of 1812. --Kevin Myers 23:46, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] history articles on wikipedia?

Hello Kevin, I’m an historian working at the Center for History and New Media at George Mason University (http://chnm.gmu.edu/) and we are very interested in digital historical works, including the writing of history on Wikipedia. We’d like to talk to people about their experiences working on articles in Wikipedia, in connection with a larger project on the history of the free and open source software movement. Would you be willing to talk with us about your involvement, either by phone, a/v chat, IM, or email? This could be as lengthy or brief a conversation as you wish.

Thanks for your consideration.

Joan Fragaszy

[edit] Numbers of blacks fighting-- Loyalist v. Patriot

Hi, Kevin. Issue has been taken with the statement "At least 5,000 black soldiers fought as Patroits; about 1,000 fought with the British as Loyalists" in the American Revolution article, and it looks like you were the source (Nov. 19 2004). Gary Nash, in the Unknown American Revolution has "tens of thousands" of slaves escaping to British lines in response to Dunmore's proclamation, but fails to provide a figure for the number who were put under arms. I've seen your work on numbers in the War of 1812 article-- any chance you want to revise the 5000/1000 figures?

TIA, Mwanner | Talk 20:45, 26 October 2005 (UTC)

Howdy. I've actually already responded to this issue on the talk page here. Citing a web page as a historical source is something I try to avoid, so if we can find a more scholarly source with black troop numbers, I'm all for it. --Kevin Myers | on Wheels! 15:06, 27 October 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. For the nonce, I think I'll stick to adding something about the tens of thousands, and tiptoe around the "under arms" issue. -- Mwanner | Talk 18:54, 27 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] It's Your Misfortune

In your edits to "It's Your Misfortune and None of My Own" (history book) you say "Unlike traditional histories of the American West, White's book is a history of a region, rather than the story of the expanding frontier". Do you have any traditional histories in mind? White's book is not so very different from many others, including Hawgood's 1967 book America's Western Frontiers (book). BookCover 16:01, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

White's book is part of the "New Western History" movement, which is about regional (rather than national) history. But I see here that one reviewer calls it a "synthesis" of the New Western History, which means of course there are other regional history books before his. I'll link that page and revise accordingly. --Kevin

I agree. White may well be a 1990s New Western History advocate, but his distinction is not in writing a regional history of the West. There have been many before him. Hawgood's award winning history was published in 1967. West's (West, Howard Robert (ed.). This is the West. Chicago: Rand McNally, 1957), a winner of the Western Writers of America's Spur Award in non-fiction, was published in 1957. Nor is White's distinction in rejecting Turner's frontier thesis as the definition of the West. The theory, over the last hundred years or so, has been rejected, revived, mocked, praised, and discarded too many times to count. BookCover 05:59, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Yup. --Kevin

[edit] The Kevin Myers?

Hi there, I have to admit I did quite a bit of stalking to confirm that you are not the Kevin Myers I am familiar with. He is quite an opinionated (and divisive) journalist in Ireland who writes regularly for The Irish Times. I still thought it may have been that he had become massively interested in American history, but something about the writing doesn't convince me. Or am I wrong? Oh, and just "for the record", I think archives are essential to every talk page - otherwise (barring diffs, which can be difficult to find two months on), it can be a frustrating task to keep track of the vast network of interactions you build up - you never know when you'll need to find them again... Cormaggio ^@ 10:42, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I wondered if anyone would ever wonder if I was that guy. I'm not. The Kevin Myers is an opinionated Irish bastard. I'm an opinionated American bastard. --Kevin

Ah, so you knew him - one reason for writing was to let you know of his existence, in case someone threw you later on by assuming you were he. Cheers. Another Irish bastard 23:11, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Kevin, this is a perfect case for a name change. In my wildest dreams I couldn't have imagined such a scenario. You poor lad.El Gringo 04:04, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Continental Army

I notice that (before I made any changes) many entries in the Continental Army categories are for State militia. I suppose that the purpose of the Continental Army categories could be changed to include Militia. Or create parallel categories for militia matching the Continental categories. Thanks. Hmains 18:08, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, probably a category called Category:American militiamen in the American Revolution would do the trick.

This is good. This is why I hesitated: What do we do about all the many officers who have a bio that shows they were originally in the militia and then incorporated into the Continental Army. Place them in both categories? Or place them only in the 'higher' Contentintal Army category? What is the more likely to be maintained correctly over the years? Thanks Hmains 18:31, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Good question. I suppose the second option is better: if they served in both, the Continental Army category is more important. Probably there will eventually be sub-categories of militiamen by state, and they'll show up in those too. --Kevin

Excuse my dropping in, but I see a further complication. The lines seem to be blurred. Bernard Romans received commissions from three different states. In one case he was commissioned by New York upon being recommended to the state by the Continental Congress. He currently is in the Continental Army category. I have not seen any source that he received a commission in the Continental Army, but the Continental Congress exercised oversight over his service for New York. Have fun sorting that out. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 19:06, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

I posted these comments on the talk page:

Category talk:American militiamen in the American Revolution. Your comments please. Thanks. Hmains 16:38, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:Campaignbox American Revolutionary War: Boston

Thanks for starting this template. I'm glad it exists, but I have a few issues with starting the campaign with the Powder Alarm. Would you mind talking about this on its talk page? Flying Jazz 04:58, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:Campaignbox American Revolutionary War

I actually changed the name because my assumption was that the template would be placed on each of the theater articles, in order to allow sideways navigation between them (similar to sideways navigation between battles with the other campaignboxes), in which case it might not be clear what "Campaigns and theaters" refers to. I'll leave it up to you how you want to deal with that, though. —Kirill Lokshin 15:40, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Opposition to the War of 1812

I've created Opposition to the War of 1812. You seem to know more about the subject than I - most of my references I got from your post to the Wikiproject:Anti-war talk page. Would you mind looking it over, rating it, suggesting or making changes, when you have time? Kalkin 19:27, 2 April 2006 (UTC)