Citizens More than Soldiers: The Kentucky Militia and Society in the Early Republic (Studies in War, Society, and the Militar)

citiz e ns more tha n

soldi ers

Studies in War, Society, and the Military gener al editors

Peter Maslowski University of Nebraska–Lincoln

David Graff Kansas State University

Reina Pennington Norwich University

editorial board

D’Ann Campbell Director of Government and Foundation Relations, U.S. Coast Guard Foundation

Mark A. Clodfelter National War College

Brooks D. Simpson Arizona State University

Roger J. Spiller George C. Marshall Professor of Military History U.S. Army Command and General Staff College (retired)

Timothy H. E. Travers University of Calgary

Arthur Waldron Lauder Professor of International Relations University of Pennsylvania

CITIZENS D F I <  K ? 8 E

SOLDIERS K?<B<EKL:BPD@C@K@88E;JF:@
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uni v ersi t y of nebr ask a press l i n c o l n a nd l o nd o n

© 2007 by the Board of Regents of the University of Nebraska All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America ∞ Portions of chapters 3, 4, and 5 were previously published in “Rethinking the Social Role of the Militia: Community Building in Antebellum Kentucky” in The Journal of Southern History 68 (November 2002): 777–816. Portions of chapter 7 were previously published in “Refuge of Manhood: Masculinity and the Militia Experience in Kentucky” in Southern Manhood: Perspectives on Masculinity in the Old South, eds. Craig Thompson Friend and Lorri Glover (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2004), 1–21. © 2004 by the University of Georgia Press. Athens, Georgia 30602. Set in Chaparral Pro by Omega Clay. Designed by Omega Clay. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Laver, Harry S. Citizens more than soldiers : the Kentucky militia and society in the early republic / Harry S. Laver. p. cm.—(Studies in war, society, and the military) Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 978-0-8032-2970-9 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Kentucky—History, Military—19th century. 2. Kentucky—Militia —History—19th century. 3. Soldiers—Kentucky—History—19th century. 4. Civil-military relations—Kentucky—History—19th century. 5. Kentucky—Social conditions—19th century. 6. Kentucky—Politics and government—1792–1865. 7. Social classes—Kentucky—History—19th century. 8. Community life—Kentucky—History—19th century. 9. Political culture—Kentucky—History—19th century. 10. Masculinity—Kentucky—History—19th century. I. Title. f455.l24 2007 355.3'70976909034—dc22 2007012550

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List of Tables

vii

Acknowledgments

ix

 Rethinking the Social Role of the Militia

1

 The Hunters of Kentucky

9

 Public Gatherings and Social Order

20

 Stability and Security in a Time of Transition

48

 Proponents of Democracy and Partisanship

66

 A Refuge of Manhood

98

 Fighters, Protectors, and Men

128

Conclusion: Citizens More than Soldiers

144

Appendix

147

Notes

155

Bibliography

199

Index

211

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           

Slave Ownership among Selected Officers, 1790–1811 148 Political Participation among Selected Officers, 1790–1811 148 Slave Ownership among Selected Enlisted Men, 1790–1811 149 Byrd Price’s and John Wallace’s 1793 Muster Rolls 149 Slave Ownership among Selected Officers, War of 1812 150 Political Participation among Selected Officers, War of 1812 150 Slave Ownership among Selected Enlisted Men, War of 1812 151 Capt. Thomas Kennedy’s 1812 Muster Roll 151 Slave Ownership among Selected Officers, Mexican War 152 Political Participation among Selected Officers, Mexican War 152 Slave Ownership among Selected Enlisted Men, Mexican War 153 Capt. Frank Chambers’s 1847 Muster Roll 153

[ vii ]

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The single name of an author on any published work is gravely misleading. Behind that individual stand scores of people who provide assistance and support, all of whom cannot be named but deserve thanks nonetheless. For their contributions to this work, I would like to thank the librarians and staff of the David Library of the American Revolution, Washington Crossing, Pennsylvania; the Department of Special Collections and the Margaret I. King Library, University of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky; the Filson Club Historical Society, Frankfort, Kentucky; the Kentucky Historical Society, Frankfort, Kentucky; and the Kentucky Military Records and Research Branch Library, Frankfort, Kentucky. In addition, the Departments of History at both the University of Kentucky and the United States Military Academy at West Point provided financial assistance. I would also like to express my gratitude to all those who tirelessly provided scholarly direction and advice, especially Lance Banning, Don Higginbotham, George Herring and his wife Dottie, Cynthia Kierner, Jeffrey Matthews, Bo Morgan, and Joel Quinn. My greatest debt remains to those friends and family who believed, especially Mom, Dad, and Tara.

[ ix ]

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sol d ie r s

( r e t hink ing t he s o ci a l r ol e of t he mil i t i a

In Requiem for a Nun, William Faulkner introduces the fictional town of Jefferson, Mississippi, located in the equally fictitious Yoknapatawpha County. Central to his story, set in the 1830s, is the capture of a gang of ruffians: “A gang—three or four—of Natchez Trace bandits . . . [was] captured by chance by an incidental band of civilian more-or-less militia and brought in to the Jefferson jail because it was the nearest one, the militia band being part of a general muster at Jefferson two days before for a Fourth-of-July barbecue, which by the second day had been refined by hardy elimination into one drunken brawling which rendered even the hardiest survivors vulnerable residents.” The story continues as Jefferson’s residents struggle to find a suitable place to secure the “bandits,” but of greater historical significance is the brief appearance of the local militia. Faulkner’s portrayal of the volunteer soldiers conforms to popular perceptions of the early national militia. Incompetent at best, dangerous at worst, militiamen are usually depicted as drunken buffoons who stumbled into a crooked line, poked each other with cornstalk weapons, and inevitably shot their commander in the backside with a rusty, antiquated musket. Caricatures of the over-accoutered captain and his clownish part-time charges are familiar to even casual scholars of the new republic. Yet even in Faulkner’s amusingly inept company of Yoknapatawpha “more-or-less” citizen-soldiers, there are hints of something more at work. His militia had mustered in preparation for the upcoming July Fourth celebration, an occasion that typically included men in uniform. Militiamen frequently organized the day’s activities, made patriotic speeches at the afternoon barbecue, and concluded the day with a long series of toasts. The Jefferson militia company had also deemed it necessary to curtail further celebration to capture the wandering felons, car[ 1 ]

re t hink ing t he soci al role of t he mil i t ia

rying out another responsibility generally ascribed to citizen-soldiers —the maintenance of civil order. The militiamen’s appearance in Faulkner’s tale bears one additional similarity to the traditional understanding of the American militia’s place in the early nineteenth century: it is peripheral and fleeting. Beyond stereotypes, little is known about the ways the militia affected communities in the early republic. In his study of the trans-Appalachian frontier, Malcolm J. Rohrbough hints that historians have underestimated the social influence of the militia, noting that musters were “the largest gathering of people” communities witnessed, where “men would gather in small groups to play at politics, swap horses, engage in rough and tumble, debate the leading questions of the day (the price of land and crops), or simply exchange news.” A reassessment demonstrates that scholars have indeed erred by ignoring or discounting the militia’s significance in early nineteenth-century American society. In the years between the ratification of the U.S. Constitution and the rising sectional conflict of the 1850s, American society underwent a rapid transition, if not in fact a revolution. Frontier outposts exploded into cities in which social, political, and economic competition was daily fare. The Revolutionaries’ belief in an organic society led by a natural aristocracy gave way to the Jacksonians’ faith in the common man, while an aversion to factionalism was overcome by the competitive spirit of the second party system. The simple and intimate practice of bartering among neighbors surrendered to the impersonal complexity of a market economy. And more subtly, concepts of masculinity that honored a man’s independence and self-sacrifice lost out to the competitiveness and self-interest of capitalism. The militia’s involvement in these transformations has eluded both military and social historians. What role did the militia play in creating and reinforcing the complex processes that created a community out of disparate individuals? How did the militia’s activities confirm the stability of long-established social and economic hierarchies while fostering the aspirations of the common man? How significant was its part in the rejection of the elites’ political hegemony? How did it influence men’s self-identity, particularly their conception of masculinity and appropriate male behavior? The militia remained an active and influential civil institution throughout the great transitions of the early nineteenth century. Evidence of its influence is found in the public sphere—the arena in which individu[ 2 ]

re t hink ing t he soci al role of t he mil i t ia

als within local communities engage in a rational discourse over issues of broad interest and produce a community identity and collective consciousness. Such social intercourse is rarely receptive to the voice of a single individual expressing personal concern. To compensate for this limitation, individuals join civil institutions that serve as intermediaries between the private and public spheres. Historian John L. Brooke, in his study of voluntary societies, especially fraternal orders in the early republic, argues that such groups “stood at the epicenter of efforts to define and redefine the public arena.” The militia, which was found in nearly every town and village and had a far more inclusive membership than the fraternal orders did, functioned in just such a manner. Moreover, given the militia’s geographic pervasiveness, widespread participation, and longevity, its impact on local communities and American society as a whole exceeded that of any fraternal institution. In fact, the militia was more influential than any other formal community organization in the transformation of early nineteenth-century American society. Evidence of the militia’s impact falls into three topical categories: the militia and community, the militia and politics, and the militia and masculinity. The creation of a community is a complex and often paradoxical process. In the early nineteenth century, men and women, rich and poor, and white and black shared the public arena at events like Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha July Fourth celebration. Men and women with diverse social, political, racial, and economic backgrounds gathered in the melting pot of a shared, collective community experience. Such events reinforced bonds of commonality as neighbors shared food and drink, ideas and emotions. These public gatherings, like the sides of a ladder joining individual rungs into a unified whole, bound disparate individuals into a singular community. But like a ladder’s rungs, each person had his or her place—some higher, some lower—constrained by social hierarchies. Reinforcement of the hierarchical ladders of race, class, and gender characterized Fourth of July celebrations as well as other militia-sponsored community activities. Order and deference were as much a part of militia events as uniforms and muskets. Despite the popularity of community merrymaking, citizen-soldiers were more than celebration soldiers. Companies turned out to commemorate the deaths of public figures and war dead, to welcome and escort visiting dignitaries, and to mark occasions such as the construction of a [ 3 ]

re t hink ing t he soci al role of t he mil i t ia

new railroad or the Louisiana Purchase. Until the formation of professional police forces, they also bore the responsibility for maintaining community order and putting down civil insurrections. Furthermore, citizen-soldiers facilitated economic diversification by providing security for the nascent industries that dotted the frontier and by creating a demand for goods and services in established communities. Beyond these community activities, the militia was instrumental in the democratization of the electorate, the acceptance of party politics, and the divisiveness of the second party system. From late eighteenthcentury politics to the intensity of Jacksonian partisanship, the militia frequently and intentionally stepped into the political arena. In the days before the advent of Whigs and Democrats, an organizational structure that theoretically included every white male of voting age made the enrolled militia a convenient and accessible vehicle for political activism—in other words, a proto-political organization. Membership in a company provided a readily accessible pathway for those who desired to participate in the political process, especially men of lesser economic and social standing, thereby advancing the process of democratization. In the 1830s and 1840s, when the second party system developed into a two-party war, volunteer companies became adjunct political organizations associated with the burgeoning Whig and Democratic parties. By functioning as auxiliaries to the larger partisan organizations, militia units made a further contribution to the democratization of American politics. The spectacle of parades, colorful uniforms, and discharging muskets and cannons helped attract large crowds to rallies and barbecues. In a dramatic way, the crackle and thunder of weapons put the countryside on notice that a partisan storm was brewing. The party faithful and the just plain curious turned out to receive—along with fellowship, food, and drink—a helping of speeches, toasts, and political principles. Militia officers and town elders spoke of political ideologies, the nation’s heroes, and the importance of patriotic fervor. Ultimately, while the specific message of each event varied with time, place, speaker, and party, the process drew Americans into an expanding and increasingly democratic and partisan political process. The militia’s influence reached past public ceremonies and political rallies into the private sphere of self-identities. Social historian E. Anthony Rotundo argues that during the first half of the nineteenth century American males faced a confusing and conflicted world as con[ 4 ]

re t hink ing t he soci al role of t he mil i t ia

cepts of masculinity were undergoing significant change. The traditional markers of manhood, founded upon land-owning independence and a commitment to community through self-sacrifice, were withering under the intense competition of the market economy. Aggressiveness and a competitive spirit seemingly overwhelmed self-denial and a sense of responsibility to the commonweal. Rotundo’s conclusions are sound but limited. He has little to say about what part, if any, citizen-soldiers had in this social transformation. The volunteer militia in the post–War of 1812 era in fact played a significant role as its martial ethos and culture maintained traditionally recognized and accepted norms of white male behavior. The relationship between masculinity and a martial culture has been a long-term affair, stretching back to the ancients of Greece and Rome. From time immemorial, men had demonstrated their claims to manhood through warmaking and participation in a military culture. In this respect, men in the early nineteenth century had changed little from their ancient progenitors; they maintained the association between maleness and militarism. As volunteer militia members, they adopted a specific vocabulary, an affinity for uniforms, and a weapons culture that reinforced centuries-old traditions and defined appropriate male behavior. Participation in a volunteer company, especially one that mustered to battle treacherous British or villainous Mexicans, offered a refuge of manhood in a time of social uncertainty. Marching off to defend community and country, citizen-soldiers demonstrated to family, to friends, and perhaps most importantly, to themselves that they were indeed worthy of the legacy inherited from their Revolutionary forefathers. Historians are just beginning to undertake in-depth examinations of militia organizations to determine their social significance in the early republic. The existing scholarship has focused on battles and military campaigns or has included citizen-soldiers as interesting but irrelevant curiosities in broader analyses of nineteenth-century society. Even important works by historians John Shy, Don Higginbotham, and John Hope Franklin suffer from such limitations. Shy was one of the first historians to examine the militia’s contribution to society as something other than an auxiliary to the regular army, arguing that the colonial militia was not the static, homogeneous organization described by earlier historians. His analysis broke new ground, but he remained firmly fixed on the martial exercises of the colonial militia. Higginbotham [ 5 ]

re t hink ing t he soci al role of t he mil i t ia

brought to light some of the civil activities citizen-soldiers performed during the Revolutionary War. When permitted to fulfill the roles for which they were intended—as a police force, as partisans to suppress loyalist activity, as participants in a guerrilla war, or as a quasi-government between the fall of the royal administrations and the implementation of the state governments—the militia usually acted competently. By recognizing the militia’s proper role during the war and evaluating its performance based on those criteria, Higginbotham maintains that citizen-soldiers made a contribution to the war’s outcome that historians had not recognized previously. His analysis, like Shy’s, centered on the militia’s contribution to the war effort. In The Militant South, John Hope Franklin briefly examines the southern militia as a social institution, focusing on the volunteer units that proliferated during the antebellum years. He suggests that they reinforced the social hierarchy, promoted patriotism and community pride, offered a means of social and political advancement, and provided opportunities for social interaction through their muster days and military balls. The work of these early historians laid a foundation for a deeper analysis of the militia, and a few historians have attempted to expand on these tentative beginnings. Mary Ellen Rowe examines the antebellum militia in the West and describes their social and political contributions to frontier society. George Vourlojianis’s study of the Cleveland Grays, a nineteenth-century volunteer militia company, is an entertaining account of the Grays’ history, but his greatest contribution is revealing the company’s social role in its community. In addition to the standard holiday parades, the Grays appeared at inaugurations and dignitaries’ funerals, represented Cleveland at World’s Fairs and Mardi Gras celebrations, contributed to the local economy through an extensive building program, and advanced members’ political and financial careers. Through these activities the Grays contributed to Cleveland’s development for more than eighty years. Similarly, G. Ward Hubbs traces the experiences of the Greensboro Guards, an Alabama volunteer company that organized in the 1830s, fought in the Civil War, and survived into the late nineteenth century. Like the Grays, the Guards served their community both as defenders and as an essential element of its social, political, and economic evolution. While these works each focus on a single militia company, this book takes a broader perspective through a statewide study of the Kentucky [ 6 ]

re t hink ing t he soci al role of t he mil i t ia

militia. Never fitting comfortably into either the North or the South, the Bluegrass State has historically exhibited characteristics of both regions while avoiding the most extreme polemics of its northern and southern neighbors. The state’s ambiguous regional personality carries over into its internal identity, where geographic diversity dictates cultural diversity. The mountainous east slopes down to the rolling hills of the central Bluegrass Region, which gives way to the commercial and river culture of the west. Most significant, however, is the timing of Kentucky’s settlement and subsequent growth. Explored and settled in the 1770s and 1780s, the former Virginia county became a state in 1792 and entered the nineteenth century as one of the union’s newest members. In the span of one generation, isolated outposts like Fort Boonesborough and Bryant’s Station gave way to burgeoning cities: Louisville pulled river trade off the Ohio, and Lexington became known as the Athens of the West, a center of social, political, and economic activity. No other state experienced a more rapid transformation from unforgiving wilderness to relatively comfortable urbanity. This pattern of progress allows the examination of Kentucky’s development from a scattering of frontier settlements to a mature network of thriving communities just sixty years later. The compression of Kentucky’s development makes manageable the most significant challenge in undertaking a social study of the militia—the nature of the evidence itself. Rarely mentioned in summaries, abstracts, or annotations, and almost never indexed, evidence of the militia’s social activities appears in the most obscure and unexpected of places. The author of a four-column newspaper political tract might make a passing reference to a speech delivered at the local militia company’s annual squirrel hunt and barbecue. An entrepreneur’s lengthy letter bemoaning his financial trials could conclude with his hopes of collecting a few debts at the upcoming militia muster. Each bit of evidence is the proverbial needle in a haystack, but Kentucky’s brief journey from frontier to social maturity creates a manageable haystack. The focus on a single state also allows the depth of understanding necessary to make a valid assessment of the relationships between citizen-soldiers and their communities. This approach exposes the intimacies of social interaction that must be understood in order to determine the militia’s contribution to a nation in transition at a time when most Americans maintained a provincial orientation. Local insti[ 7 ]

re t hink ing t he soci al role of t he mil i t ia

tutions, administered by local citizens, carried out the activities and responsibilities that ensured the continuity of daily life. The average farmer or shopkeeper rarely encountered a state official, let alone a public figure of national office or reputation. Perspectives remained local or regional—rarely, if ever, national. This book establishes the relationship between the militia and the progression of Kentucky society by pressing beyond the traditional boundaries of militia history and revealing the citizen-soldiers’ influence on the transformation of frontier settlements into nineteenth-century communities. More than a dysfunctional military reserve, the militia established community identities and social structure, participated in politics, kept the public peace, encouraged economic activity, and defined what it meant to be a man. What follows is not a traditional military history of bullets and battles but the story of citizen-soldiers and their contribution to the transformation of the United States.

[ 8 ]

) t he hun t e r s of k e n t uck y

The militia was not designed as an agent of social, economic, or political transformation, nor did citizen-soldiers necessarily see themselves in that role. Yet that was indeed the role the militia played in the early republic, and it played the role well. Nevertheless, citizen-soldiers maintained their traditional responsibility as a military force commanded by community leaders, and the history of battlefields and the militia’s organizational evolution warrants a brief overview. In addition, this chapter includes an analysis of the militia participants’ financial well-being and the offices held by enlisted men and officers, which further demonstrates the influence that citizen-soldiers held in their communities. The conclusion of the Seven Years’ War in 1763 eliminated for British settlers the centuries-old annoyance of their French neighbors to the north and west. For royal officials, however, the victory initiated new challenges in governing the colonies. More adventurous-minded Americans began to trek westward, crossing the Appalachian Mountains in search of land, furs, and fortune. Ignoring the ill-conceived Proclamation Line of 1763, settlers traveled through passes such as the Cumberland Gap and into the fertile Kentucky District of Virginia. By 1775 the westward flow of Americans had grown from a trickle to a torrent, and although the French were gone, the Native American population posed a serious threat to western whites. Encounters with Shawnee, Miami, Mingo, and Wyandot warriors meant sleepless nights for white settlers and political consternation in the halls of government as first colonial and then federal officials sought a policy to avoid increasingly violent confrontations. The linchpin of an effective frontier strategy was the militia. Settlers who journeyed west carried with them the framework of Virginia’s mili[ 9 ]

t he hun t ers of k en t uck y

tia system and established a county-based defensive organization. A colonel, confusingly known as the county lieutenant, commanded militia members by supervising drills and muster days and organizing measures to thwart Indian attacks. Before the 1790s, necessity dictated that every able-bodied male who could handle a gun—and often those who could not—be prepared to answer the alarm in the event of an Indian raid. In 1777 Kentucky County held its first formal muster when 144 men turned out, and for the next fifteen years they and those who followed engaged in an on-again, off-again battle with Native Americans. Initially governed by the laws of Virginia, Kentucky’s citizen-soldiers differed little from their eastern counterparts. Statute required all free males ages eighteen to forty-five to participate in seven musters per year, five company musters and two regimental. Each company, at least on paper, consisted of eighty to one hundred men, with ten companies in a battalion and two battalions in a regiment. Each man was to furnish a rifle or musket, a half pound of powder, and one pound of lead, all to be kept in good order. They trained in the manner prescribed by Baron Von Steuben’s 1779 Manual of Discipline and Formation and were supervised either by officers of their own choosing or by those selected by a designated committee of local militiamen. Field grade officers with a rank of major or higher gained their rank at the hand of the governor, where political connections were more valuable than military expertise. The law granted exemptions to men deemed essential to the state’s economic and political viability and to those involved in activities critical to defense, such as gunsmithing. Millers, ironworkers, and tobacco inspectors as well as legal clerks, elected civil officials, and seminary professors legally avoided the periodic muster days and the occasional calls for service. Kentuckian James Dunlap, although claiming none of the standard exemptions, recalled later that he was sure he would “be excused on a/c of having but one eye.” Unfortunately for him, “Col. McDowell stepped forward, & s[ai]d, as good a soldier as he ever had in his regiment was Joe Young, & he had but 1 eye. So I had to pay a man 40/s to be my substitute.” Some officers obviously took militia service more seriously than others, but fines imposed for nonattendance achieved only moderate success in rousting wayward soldiers. The poorest had no cash and the well-to-do saw payment as preferable to mingling with their less-refined neighbors.

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t he hun t ers of k en t uck y

Nevertheless, on August 19, 1782, one hundred and eighty Kentuckians participated in the only battle of the Revolution fought in Kentucky. The militiamen stumbled into an Indian force at the Battle of Blue Licks, and in a brief but bloody fight, nearly half of the Kentuckians were killed. The end of the Revolution initiated a decline in random Indian raids in Kentucky, but the threat to white settlers was far from over. Passage of the Northwest Ordinance shifted attention to the territory north of Kentucky where hostilities between whites and Indians continued unabated. Kentuckians accompanied George Rogers Clark’s expeditions, typically undertaken without sanction from Virginia authorities, against northern tribes during the 1780s on the condition that they be permitted to fight on horseback. In 1790 men from the Bluegrass Region marched with Gen. Josiah Harmar’s ill-fated expedition into the Old Northwest. Made up of draftees and substitutes, Harmar’s mixed force of regulars and militiamen disintegrated into a disorganized mob when they encountered a band of Miami Indians. The Kentucky militia, under the command of Col. John Hardin, gave an especially poor accounting, being overly aggressive in the attack and overly eager in the retreat. Arthur St. Clair’s campaign into Miami country the following year fared no better. In early November 1791 one thousand Indians surprised St. Clair’s regulars and militiamen. Again the amateur soldiers led the flight to the rear; six hundred of the army of fourteen hundred men did not survive to return home. Success finally came in 1794 at the Battle of Fallen Timbers, when Gen. Anthony Wayne led an army of thirty-five hundred men, including approximately three hundred Kentucky volunteers, to northern Ohio, where they essentially eliminated Indian aggression in the Northwest. During the campaign, “Mad Anthony” learned of the Kentuckians’ affinity for horses when militia volunteers refused to fight on foot, preferring instead to face their foes from the saddle. After the battle, Wayne praised the Kentuckians: “I never discover’d more true spirit & anxiety for Action than appeared to pervade the whole of the Mounted Volunteers, & . . . had the Enemy maintained their favorite ground but for one half hour longer they wou’d have most severely felt the prowess of that Corps.” The U.S. Constitution, which was ratified in 1789, gave Congress the authority to “provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the Militia.” The 1792 Uniform Militia Act, which governed the country’s militia

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for more than a century, attempted to create a uniform organization throughout the United States, define who was required to serve, outline weapons requirements, and specify brigade and regiment strengths. When Kentucky entered the union that same year, lawmakers discarded the old county system and reorganized the state’s citizen-soldiers into two divisions. The first, situated north of the Kentucky River, was placed under the command of Maj. Gen. Charles Scott. The second, located south of the river, was commanded by Gen. Benjamin Logan. In Kentucky as elsewhere, the structural reorganization of the militia did little to stop a decline in the institution’s military effectiveness and efficiency. Facing neither imminent foreign threat nor the terror of widespread Indian attacks, the militia became a paper army. Annual returns, if and when completed, showed a force that numbered in the thousands with arms to match, but in reality companies only occasionally mustered, weapons deteriorated or disappeared, and training degraded to complete ineffectiveness. When war came in 1812, the nation suffered for neglecting its militia. In the western reaches of the United States, the War of 1812 brought old enemies to battle as American militiamen again traded fire with British regulars and their Native American allies. The war began early in the West when in November 1811 an army of one thousand, including 123 Kentucky volunteers, won a victory at Tippecanoe, Indiana, under the command of local governor William Henry Harrison. Following this early victory, both national and state leaders worked to improve the organization and efficiency of the militia; but despite their efforts, the western campaigns of 1812 achieved little because supply problems hindered all serious attempts to engage the enemy. The following year began with disaster for the Americans, Kentuckians in particular. In January, Brig. Gen. James Winchester walked his army of one thousand men, eight hundred of them from Kentucky, into a surprise attack at the River Raisin in the Michigan Territory. With his troops quickly overwhelmed by British and Indians, Winchester agreed to surrender. Treachery and tragedy followed when Indian guards slaughtered at least thirty of their unarmed prisoners. Word of the massacre spread throughout the West, and for the remainder of the war, Kentuckians invoked the battle cry, “Remember the Raisin!” The opportunity for redemption and revenge presented itself nine months later, in October 1813, when the U.S. Department of War gave its approval to a large mustering of men for action in the Northwest. [ 12 ]

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William Henry Harrison served as the overall commander of the expedition and again Kentuckians turned out in force. Kentucky’s governor, sixty-three year-old Revolutionary War veteran Isaac Shelby, issued a proclamation calling for “a general rendezvous of Kentucky Volunteers.” “I will meet you there in person,” he pledged to the state’s militiamen, and he further committed himself by offering to “lead . . . [them] to the field of battle, and share with [them] the dangers and honors of the campaign.” The men of Kentucky did not disappoint. Thirty-five hundred answered Shelby’s call and joined him in the march northward into the Michigan Territory. On October 5 Shelby’s Kentuckians joined with Harrison’s army to overcome Gen. Henry Proctor’s force of British and Indians at the Battle of the Thames. Fighting from horseback, the Kentucky volunteers charged the British lines while the majority of Harrison’s men were still forming ranks. In the fog of smoke and forest thicket, Kentucky colonel Richard M. Johnson purportedly killed the Indian chief Tecumseh, demoralizing and scattering the Indian fighters and their British allies. Johnson later parlayed his battlefield heroics into political victories, becoming vice president during the Van Buren administration. After the Battle of the Thames, which concluded the northwestern phase of the war, Kentucky militiamen traveled south for one more battle. On January 8, 1815, approximately nine hundred Kentucky volunteers joined Maj. Gen. Andrew Jackson in a rout of the British at New Orleans. The victory was not without its dark side, however, as Jackson accused some Kentuckians of having “ingloriously fled” during the fighting on the west bank of the Mississippi River. Despite an independent inquiry that vindicated the Kentucky troops, Jackson refused to make an apology. Maj. Gen. John Adair, overall commander of the Kentuckians, responded with a vehement defense of his men, an act that carried him to the governorship in 1820. The Kentucky militia had made a substantial and bloody contribution to the war effort in both the northern and southern theaters. From 1815 until the middle of the century, the enrolled militia in Kentucky withered to nothing more than a phantom force. Local officers became lackadaisical in keeping rosters current, maintaining weapons, and holding muster days. They received little support, encouragement, or coercion from the federal government and even less from the state. The Paris Western Citizen carried what amounted to the enrolled [ 13 ]

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militia’s death announcement in December 1831, when it reported that, “On yesterday, . . . the house [of representatives] blowed up the Militia System, by passing a bill which dispensed with the June and Battalion musters, and Regimental training—simplifies the uniform and reduces the fines to one dollar. . . . The Militia bill, although stoutly combated by some, passed by an overwhelming majority.” With apparently little to fear from foreign aggression or internal rebellion, even Andrew Jackson questioned the usefulness of an institution that seemed woefully outdated. In an 1832 address to Congress, President Jackson expressed his doubts about the effectiveness of muster training: “Much time is lost, much unnecessary expense incurred, and much public property wasted. . . . Little useful knowledge is gained by the musters and drills as now established.” As the enrolled militia declined due to the neglect of national, state, and local officials and the lack of a clearly defined threat, the increasingly popular volunteer militia units rose in their stead. Just a month before the state legislature “blowed up the Militia System” in 1831, an announcement in the Paris, Kentucky, newspaper sought members for a new company of citizen-soldiers: “cavalry!! There will be a meeting at Herndon’s Ball Room, in the town of Paris on the 12th of November to organize a Company of Cavalry. The young gentlemen of Bourbon [County] are respectfully invited to attend and anxiously solicited to become members.” The Uniform Militia Act of 1792 sanctioned volunteer companies and permitted the creation of elite units to supplement the enrolled companies. The Kentucky legislature followed suit that same year and granted the governor powers to “commission officers to raise companies of grenadiers, light infantry, rifle men, and officers to raise as many troops of horse as he may think proper.” Although a few volunteer units had formed before the War of 1812, the majority first mustered after 1815. Volunteer units and the old enrolled companies differed in a variety of ways, not the least of which was the elaborate legislative guidelines for the enrolled units. Law required all free men between the ages of eighteen and forty-five to muster six times a year. Additional acts defined when and where to muster, fines for absences, appropriate numbers of musicians, courts-martial, and even penalties for disturbing courts-martial. However, enrolled, or uniformed, companies were rarely uniform. On muster days, enrolled men fell into line wearing whatever [ 14 ]

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clothing they happened to own. Most were lucky to bring a weapon. Volunteer units, on the other hand, were essentially self-governing. They were free to establish rules of order, the type of unit (infantry, cavalry, or artillery), and the sort of uniform they would wear. Despite these differences, Kentuckians viewed the two types of citizen-soldiers as statutorily equivalent. In 1799 the state legislature passed a law exempting members of volunteer units from the enrolled musters, and following the War of 1812, governors and citizens alike turned to the volunteer militia in times of need just as their forefathers had called upon the enrolled units. By the 1840s the volunteer companies assumed the characteristics of a fraternal organization, similar to the Freemasons or Odd Fellows, even while continuing to function as military units. Despite the social activities of these companies, the men who joined volunteer units accepted the martial responsibilities commensurate with their organizations. Volunteers consistently demonstrated willingness, if not great ability, to fight, from the Indian wars of the 1790s to the Mexican War in the 1840s. It is worth noting that although the enrolled militia and the volunteer companies were two distinct types of military organizations, in some respects their differences were inconsequential. The activities they carried out and the consequences of their actions, whether the particular unit was enrolled or volunteer, had the same significance to the community. For example, whether the militiamen who paraded and fired muskets at a Fourth of July celebration were from a rough and undisciplined 1798 enrolled company or members of an elite, polished company of 1840 volunteers, the message conveyed was one of patriotism and national unity. On the other hand, some of the differences between the two were important. For example, participants’ social standing evolved over time, altering how a given company interacted with the surrounding community. Similarly, the economic and social disparity of company members that characterized the enrolled militia was less pronounced among volunteers, with one potential consequence being a change in officer/enlisted relations. One of the clearest examples of a difference between the two militias is their political activism. While both exercised considerable political power, the enrolled companies provided a political vehicle for the common man, while the volunteers energized partisan passions. [ 15 ]

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A final point worth mentioning is that the volunteer companies became prominent after the War of 1812. One can assume that virtually every militia organization after 1815 was a group of volunteer citizen-soldiers. Volunteer companies such as the Lexington Light Infantry originated in Kentucky even before statehood. The Light Infantry and similar units participated in the Indian wars and the War of 1812, but the volunteers did not reach their heyday until the 1830s and 1840s. They marched south in 1835 and 1836 to aid the Texans in their war for independence, and a decade later they journeyed to Mexico to campaign against Santa Anna. In 1846, when President James K. Polk issued a call for twentyfive hundred volunteers from the Bluegrass State, more than ten thousand militiamen answered the challenge. The Kentuckians served their country well, participating in nearly every major battle and fighting with special distinction under the command of Gen. Zachary Taylor at Buena Vista. The troops returned to a hero’s welcome and were honored at dinners and barbecues. The volunteers had performed admirably and thereby eliminated any thought of trying to revive the old enrolled system. While Governor Charles Morehead conceded in 1856 that “there is in fact, no organized militia in the State,” the volunteer units continued to serve their communities and answered the call of war again in 1861, some marching north and others turning south. Just who were these men who mustered and marched off to battle during Kentucky’s first sixty years? Who led and who followed? Were they rich, poor, or somewhere in between? Did they seek political office; if so, were they successful? The answers to such questions not only further our understanding of the men who served in the militia but also explain the influence militiamen wielded in their communities. The men Kentuckians trusted to lead their fathers, brothers, and sons into battle demonstrated their leadership abilities in the public arena. From the time that Kentucky became a state in 1792 until the eve of war in 1811, the officers who commanded the enrolled militia enjoyed a moderate to substantial degree of economic success. Nearly 40 percent owned slaves, and those who did owned an average of more than six slaves per household. These were men of the middle class who had aspirations for greater wealth, and opportunities existed for the ambitious to advance. A number of officers also held political office. More than 13 percent of officers prior to the War of 1812 served either in the state [ 16 ]

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legislature or the U.S. Congress or served as governor, with the majority taking a seat in the state House of Representatives. Participation in local government, although difficult to document, was most likely widespread. Being a militia officer made an individual a likely candidate for town watch captain, sheriff, justice of the peace, or town councilman and city trustee. These trends continued during the 1812 war with Great Britain, as officers of the enrolled militia and those who commanded volunteer companies occupied essentially the same economic and political positions as their predecessors. Slave ownership increased moderately to more than 50 percent, but the average number of slaves owned nearly doubled to twelve. The number of militiamen elected to state or federal government remained fairly constant, with the state House again being the most likely destination, and three men converted their success on the battlefield into a term as Kentucky’s governor. Like those who served before the War of 1812, militia officers who served during the war years enjoyed a degree of financial comfort and the trust of their neighbors in both civil and military matters that went beyond the experience of the average nineteenth-century Kentuckian. In contrast, the officers who traveled south to fight in the Mexican War shared little in common with their predecessors. Their personal wealth was significantly lower than that of late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century officers. Barely 20 percent owned slaves, but those who did owned nine slaves on average. Nor did the volunteer officers of the 1840s enjoy much success at the polls. Less than 3 percent served their state or country as a representative or senator, and none became governor. The trends among enlisted men confirm the trends among officers; and not unexpectedly, the men who filled the ranks were not as successful, either economically or politically, as those who led. In the years before the War of 1812, approximately 9 percent of enlisted men owned slaves, each owning approximately four. Slightly less than 16 percent owned land, while nearly 30 percent owned at least one horse. Only two won elections to the state House of Representatives. Enlisted men who served during the War of 1812, like their officers, achieved greater economic success than militiamen of any other period. Approximately 23 percent owned slaves, averaging more than six per household. Nearly twice the percentage owned land and horses compared to earlier mili[ 17 ]

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tia units. None, however, won political office. The data on Mexican War enlisted men also resembles that of their officers. These were by far the poorest militia of any period. Less than 8 percent owned slaves, less than 3 percent owned land, and only 6 percent owned a horse. These numbers, while not definitive, do suggest certain trends. Least surprising is the relative degree of wealth and political office-holding enjoyed by the officers. During the early decades of the nineteenth century, the men who wielded financial and social power often doubled as political and militia leaders. These men were well known, respected, trusted, and perhaps most important, difficult to challenge successfully. In comparison to the population as a whole, they also fell within the top 10 percent of militiamen in terms of number of slaves owned. Those who served as officers were men of consequence—the social, economic, and political leaders of their communities. Their leadership of the militia was a logical extension of their place and position among neighbors. Both officers and enlisted men showed improving financial circumstances through the War of 1812 and then a sharp decline by the 1840s and the Mexican War. The earlier increase in both land and slave ownership is understandable because Kentucky became a more stable and prosperous region in the early nineteenth century. Improved transportation, reliable markets, and relief from Indian attacks promoted economic expansion and greater personal wealth. Two other factors also help to explain the economic well-being of the early militiamen. First, the enrolled militia survived through the War of 1812, and state law required the participation of all men, with only a few professions and positions excepted. While the wealthiest could evade mustering if they desired to, some chose to fulfill their responsibilities and serve. The militia laws thus ensured a more representative sampling of the male population, from all ranks of society, within the early militia than within the later all-volunteer militia. Second, the threats Kentucky faced through the War of 1812 were immediate and dangerous. Newspapers attest to the ever-present risk of Indian attacks. Issue after issue recounts bloody encounters between isolated farmers or traveling parties and bands of Shawnee, Miami, or Mingo Indians. Moreover, British and Indian campaigns in 1811 and 1812 directly threatened inhabitants of the West and initiated expeditions to the north by Kentucky militiamen. The immediacy and seriousness of these dangers motivated men to action, as the response to Governor Shelby’s call for troops in 1813 demonstrated. [ 18 ]

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Families, friends, and farms were at risk, and Kentuckians, both the powerful and the poor, fell into rank. In contrast, during the 1840s there was little concern over an imminent raid by the Mexican army. The danger was distant and was expected to remain so. Moreover, militia officers and community leaders were no longer one and the same. Different paths to political success had become accessible as voters increasingly supported professionals and business leaders. Militia service was no longer a moral or legal qualification for prominence and power. Men of established wealth and position were more inclined to remain in Kentucky, while their sons, young men in their early twenties who had yet to make their fortunes, sought adventure and glory at Monterrey, Vera Cruz, and Buena Vista. Herein lies the likely explanation for these later citizen-soldiers’ apparent poverty. By the 1850s the militia had evolved from a protective force for Virginia’s western district into a part-time military, part-time social institution for adventurous young men. A half-century of change significantly altered the structure and purpose of the militia, but it was not a rudderless ship buffeted by the storms of an evolving society. Citizen-soldiers were in fact the source, sustenance, and guiding force for many of the social transformations Americans experienced in the early republic.

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“The American Fair—Although the last toasted the first in our hearts.” Thus concluded the afternoon’s festivities in July 1800, just beyond the dusty roads of Lexington at Maxwell’s Spring, where town fathers, the militia, and citizens had gathered under a canopy of shade trees to mark the anniversary of the nation’s birth. The day began, reported the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, as previous July Fourths had across the nation and as they would for the next fifty years. The Lexington Light Infantry and the Fayette Troop of Horse, two volunteer militia companies, assembled in the town square around noon to parade through the streets among “a considerable concourse of citizens.” Halting in front of the courthouse, this day’s celebrants strained to hear above the crowd a young politician they knew as a friend and neighbor, a man who would go on to achieve national political prominence, Henry Clay. Upon the conclusion of Clay’s oration, a procession formed: the Fayette Troop of Horse in the lead (perhaps unwisely), the Lexington Light Infantry bringing up the rear, and the townspeople secure in between. One citizen enjoyed the honor of carrying a pole with a Liberty Cap gracing its top and bearing the inscription “4th july, 1776.” The parade proceeded in formation to Maxwell’s Spring outside of town, where at three o’clock, they “sat down to a handsome dinner.” Once plates were empty and stomachs full, the militia’s senior officers, accompanied by civil officials, rose to offer toasts, each receiving the audience’s approbation. “The day which gave birth to American Independence—May it never be forgotten” was the toast that began the public ritual; and the acknowledgment to the “fairer sex”—the toast to the “American Fair”—concluded the salutes. Following the toasts, the procession “returned in the same order to the public square, where the infantry company fired sixteen rounds in honor of the day. The evening concluded with a Ball.” [ 20 ]

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More than forty years later, in June 1842, another generation shared a similar experience. The Georgetown Artillery Company and the Stamping Ground Guards, two volunteer militia companies from Scott County, in Kentucky’s central Bluegrass Region, determined to organize and host “a splendid military and civil celebration” of the upcoming anniversary of the nation’s independence. Intending to make the occasion a celebration to be remembered, they invited all the volunteer companies of both Kentucky and Ohio as well as “the citizens generally of the two States.” The six-day event offered a welcome break from hot fields of tobacco and hemp, and promised great food, fun, and military competition. The Lexington companies sent a friendly warning to the neighboring Louisville Guards to “look to their laurels, or they may find that the ‘shine’ of our boys has wilted them effectually.” Each day “crowds of citizens were continuously arriving, in carriages, on horseback, and on foot, and by noon at least three or four thousand persons must have been on the ground.” Companies drilled, marched, and fired muskets and artillery. The curious gathered to hear a local politician or company officer hold forth on American virtues and heroes, and on Sunday, morning and afternoon sermons blessed the faithful. The discipline and order of the troops thoroughly impressed one observer, who wrote, “The tents were pitched in military ardor, the guards were posted, and every thing wore the appearance of a regular military encampment.” Despite the militiamen’s professional deportment, “Camp Scott” was a community affair, as much an event for civilians as for the part-time soldiers. This was especially evident at mealtime, when visitors and their hosts frequently broke bread together. Some of those in attendance “resorted to the various booths scattered around, in search of eatables and drinkables; others partook of the fare of the soldiers, and the rest were supplied at the public tables. . . . Tables were set out in many of the tents, and the ladies accommodated themselves with the greatest good humor to the efforts made to entertain them, appearing to consider a dinner in a canvas house as one of the finest frolics of which they had ever partaken.” The troops’ discipline, professionalism, and spirit convinced one civilian that “with such a soldiery the country had nothing to fear from foreign foes or domestic enemies.” Beginning in 1788 and continuing virtually uninterrupted for the next sixty years, Kentuckians reenacted these scenes at celebrations of the Fourth of July and commemorations of Washington’s Birthday, firing [ 21 ]

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guns, making speeches, and proposing toasts. Militia companies organized, sponsored, and conducted community gatherings that included holiday and anniversary celebrations, receptions, military contests, musters, and memorial and funeral processions, with the Fourth of July being only the most prominent. From the last years of the eighteenth century until the eve of the Civil War, these occasions progressed as if by script. The militia turned out to parade and discharge weapons, local officials gave lengthy speeches, and one could count on plentiful food, drink, and conversation. The significance of such gatherings goes beyond the relief they gave from sun and plow and the opportunity to turn out in military splendor. The patterns of these militia-sponsored, militia-supported events and the oral and symbolic messages they presented simultaneously created, conveyed, and reinforced a diverse array of ideas and images. First, militia events encouraged the cultivation of a national identity, a personal association with the United States that had taken root in the Revolutionary era. Second, the militia advanced a regional identity by promoting an affinity for Kentucky and the western reaches of the country. Third, gatherings of citizen-soldiers strengthened the ties that bound individuals into a local community of neighbors. Finally, the militia’s public appearances reinforced the social hierarchies of race, class, and gender, while maintaining the cross-class hegemony of white males. In short, citizen-soldiers, beyond being the nation’s first line of defense, gave substance and form to the complex and still inchoate sensibility of shared identities. Prominent and pervasive at militia gatherings was the developing sense of a national identity, a collection of ideals that was foremost in American minds on Independence Day. A typical Fourth began around ten o’clock in the morning, when uniformed militiamen gathered in the town square or around the courthouse steps, armed with pistols, swords, rifles or muskets, and in some instances an artillery piece. The crack of gunfire often welcomed the summer sun, and by mid-morning a militia officer or town elder was lecturing would-be patriots on the challenges and triumphs of America’s past. Mustering into formation, the militiamen then paraded through narrow streets and lanes, destined for a broad field or spring on the outskirts of town. There, under the out-

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reached arms of oaks and sycamores, the community congregated for a repast of barbecue and fellowship. As the heat of the day dissipated into twilight, company officers and local dignitaries rose from their chairs and, through a series of toasts, reminded the audience of the reason for gathering. Following the last toast—usually offered to the “American Fair,” a reference to wives and sweethearts—the assemblage marched back to town; and after twenty or so toasts, the evening parade undoubtedly displayed less precision than the morning’s march. Residents then peacefully “retired to their respective abodes,” reassured by the military prowess of their neighbors. In some communities the day concluded with a “splendid ball . . . where the citizen soldiers recounted the pleasures, and in the smiles of beauty forgot the fatigues of the day.” The anniversaries of Washington’s Birthday, celebrated each February 22, differed little in participation and substance from the July events and offered a colorful diversion from grey winter days. Even in relatively mild climes, winter limited the day’s outdoor activities, although early morning gun salutes were not uncommon. Occasionally, companies organized a procession that took a turn or two around town, but soon after, orators, toastmasters, and their audiences retired to the welcoming warmth and comfort of a hotel, church, or Masonic Hall. They enjoyed the traditional fare of food, drinks, and toasts, recreating the atmosphere of Independence Day summer gatherings. While the Fourth of July and Washington’s Birthday were annual observances, the militia celebrated other events as well. Military anniversaries were particularly popular, especially for battles in which Kentucky had sacrificed its native sons. In 1806 Gen. Charles Scott, a veteran of the 1794 Battle of Fallen Timbers, presided over a celebration that commemorated “Mad Anthony” Wayne’s victory. More popular was the 1813 Battle of the Thames. The Lexington Kentucky Gazette reported that celebrations attracted as many as one thousand guests who watched the militia parade and fire gun salutes while enjoying dinner, toasts, and appearances by the battle’s local hero, Col. Richard M. Johnson. The Battle of New Orleans drew the most attention, although for unexpected reasons. At first, towns marked the January 8 anniversary like any other: the militia turned out, toasts were made, and all had good fun. But by the 1830s the celebration took on a less harmonious, more partisan tone. Political battles between Whigs and Demo-

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crats spilled over into the previously nonpartisan celebration of Andrew Jackson’s victory over the British. In 1835, a few days after the holiday, the Maysville Monitor commented on the recent celebrations: The Jackson men of Lexington are of true grit. The House of Representatives of the Kentucky Legislature, refused to have a salute fired on the 8th, thus acknowledging they were sorry for the triumph of our arms at New Orleans. The news reached Lexington on the 7th, and a six pounder [artillery piece] was forth with conveyed to Frankfort by the [D]emocrats of Lexington, which aroused the slumbering Bank Tories at dawn on the 8th. In the evening it was used at Lexington, being conveyed back without the aid of the Rail Road, the President of which would grant the patriotic band no facilities.

In 1842 the Lexington Light Artillery, the apparent owners of the Democratic “six-pounder” alarm clock, remained in Lexington to mark the battle’s anniversary, but the following year they returned to the capital, much to the delight of the statewide Democratic conventioneers who were meeting in Frankfort. Delegates passed a resolution thanking the Light Artillery “for their gallant conduct displayed by meeting on this occasion, and thundering in the Capital Square of Kentucky the glory of the 8th day of January.” In 1845 the state Senate took steps to block the annual discharge that undoubtedly grated on the Whigs’ nerves far more than the general public’s. Senators rejected a motion to “cause a National salute to be fired on the Capital Square on to-morrow morning at sunrise.” Along with the rest of the nation, the Lexington militia had joined the popular pastime of partisan politics. Anniversaries like the Battle of New Orleans were reason to celebrate, but visits by living war heroes, presidents, and other nineteenth-century celebrities created a special brand of excitement, and militiamen took seriously their duty to welcome famous travelers. In 1850 Capt. F. Kern of Louisville assured city officials that he and his men were in constant readiness “not only to do service to [our] state and country but at all times to give the best military reception that [we] can to distinguished strangers.” During such visits, the man of the hour received the community’s gratitude by way of an endless series of handshakes and the nineteenth-century version of a rubber chicken dinner. Most impressive was the reception that welcomed the Marquis de Lafayette on his travels through the United States in 1824 and 1825. In New York the [ 24 ]

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city’s militia companies turned out to welcome the Revolutionary hero and protégé of George Washington. In Boston, the Boston Light Infantry, the Winslow Blues, the Fusiliers, the New England Guards, and the City Guards mustered to “conduct him into town.” “A large cavalcade of troops and citizens” met the Marquis in Hartford, and a military review pointed the way to Yorktown. Louisville militiamen began to prepare for Lafayette’s visit months in advance, going so far as to organize a new volunteer company christened with the flattering if unoriginal appellation, the Lafayette Guards. The local newspaper followed his progress across the nation, reprinting accounts of his visits and the militia receptions he received in Alabama, Missouri, and Louisiana. A one hundred–gun salute announced his arrival in New Orleans. After the general finally appeared at Louisville’s waterfront, the Lafayette Guards, the Lafayette Cavalry, the Louisville Guards, the Light Infantry, and an artillery company became his constant companions. Thousands lined the streets, women and children filled windows, and flowers and handkerchiefs littered his path. On the following day, Lafayette crossed the river to Jeffersonville, Indiana, where crowds repeated the preceding day’s events. Next he set out for central Kentucky. Before arriving in Lexington, Lafayette passed through neighboring Woodford County, where Captain Blackburn’s militiamen escorted the general to the county line. Lexington’s military organizations then relieved Blackburn’s men and welcomed the famed American ally. The entourage proceeded to town, where Lafayette reviewed his military escort and paused to shake the hand of each officer. The following morning, after a night of dining and conversing with town elders and militia officers, the previous day’s events were repeated as the procession headed north toward Scott County, where the Georgetown Troop replaced the Lexington companies. The Georgetown militia remained with Lafayette “until their place [was] supplied by some other escort.” This hero of the Revolution never wanted for traveling companions. The general’s departure from the United States a few months later evoked memories of his arrival, as militia escorts, musket salutes, and artillery fire bade Washington’s lieutenant farewell. The militia put on similar but less ambitious receptions for presidents James Monroe, Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, William Henry Harrison, and Zachary Taylor. The visit of Monroe to Lexington in 1819 produced a profusion of citizen-soldiers. A few miles outside of town, [ 25 ]

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Monroe and his companions “were met by the committee of arrangements, and the troop of cavalry. About a mile and a half from town they were met by the Light Infantry and Rifle companies and a number of citizens. In the vicinity of town the company of Artillery received the procession under a federal salute.” One disgruntled resident, perhaps an old Federalist, remarked that the militia’s plans “to make a military parade and march out to escort him to [his] lodgings” would not “reflect any peculiar credit on the town. . . . It ought to be remembered that Lexington was not silent on the . . . pomp displayed, when Mr. Monroe made his eastern tour.” Despite the writer’s hope that Monroe “would be treated on his passage through this state, as a man, and not as a God,” the military pageant proceeded as planned. This concerned citizen was probably equally agitated over the stir Andrew Jackson created when he visited in 1824 and 1829. During his first tour, he stopped in Chillicothe, Ohio, where the Chillicothe Blues “escorted the General into town” to review the company with “manifest pleasure.” Jackson continued his midwestern tour and received artillery salutes and parades in Louisville and Jeffersonville, Indiana. Jackson made a return visit to Louisville as president, greeted by the standard receptions, parades, and weapon displays. In 1842, when Jackson’s successor, Martin Van Buren, came calling, “the appearance of all the companies was fine and reflected credit upon the martial spirit of our city and the public spirit of her young men.” Governor of Indiana William Henry Harrison received a militia reception in 1812 when he traveled to Frankfort and Lexington; and in 1840, when then President-elect Harrison stopped in Fayette County, “the military made a very splendid appearance, and performed their parts with an accuracy which did great credit to their discipline.” Party politics, however, tainted this visit. One Democratic partisan remarked that the reception of “Old Tippecanoe” was “just exactly what the getters up of it desired it should be—a party triumph. . . . For one, we take no exception to the affair—we feel perfectly willing the whigs should manage their matters in their own way— but after Tuesday’s display, we hope to hear no more from them about ‘manworship,’ the danger of ‘military chieftains,’ and the extreme folly of admiring ‘heroes,’ and being captivated by ‘military glory.’” Unperturbed by Democratic sour grapes, Kentucky Whigs turned out again with a reception for Zachary Taylor. The Second Regiment of Kentucky Volunteers, themselves veterans of the Mexican conflict, reformed their [ 26 ]

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ranks in 1849 for Taylor’s visit to Frankfort. Upon his arrival at the state capital, the militiamen presented their former commander with the regiment’s “torn and tattered” ensign. According to the Paris Western Citizen, “Shout after shout hailed the old General as he stepped from the boat and passed through the ranks of his brave comrades in arms, and ascended the steps of the carriage near by, over which that old powderscorched flag was drooping.” The most popular figure on the barbecue circuit was Kentucky’s favorite son, Henry Clay, who received so many invitations while on his journeys to and from Congress that he surely never went long without a meal. The militia turned out whenever he joined a community for an evening of food and drink, as they did in Shelbyville in 1829. “Captain Bowlin’s Company of Artillery and a large number of the citizens of town and country” joined Clay and marched in procession “to the place designated for the Barbecue.” Participants performed the traditional rituals of celebration and offered toasts to the honored guest, other men of import, and the day’s pressing political concerns. Toast making, one of the nineteenth century’s most public forms of communication, was standard fare at nearly every militia event, but more significantly, it was a ritual that created and reinforced values, attitudes, and ideologies, including the development of nationalism. Newspaper narratives of holiday celebrations and their accompanying toasts provide a progressive record of how and when Americans appropriated specific images, ideas, and individuals to craft a national identity. Two examples illustrate this progression. In July 1798 Lexington’s three volunteer militia companies held a joint Independence Day celebration, and following tradition, the conclusion of the meal brought company commanders to their feet, each offering a toast as friends and family looked on. The community’s most powerful and respected men praised the United States, the Constitution, George Washington, the late Benjamin Franklin, and the militia, “the bulwark of [the] country in the hour of danger.” Nearly twenty years later Lexingtonians gathered on the Fourth to see their militia parade and to enjoy “an elegant dinner.” Echoing the past, speakers saluted Washington, the militia, and the aging Thomas Jefferson, but the intervening years had also produced new subjects for holiday notoriety: “The heroes . . . [of] our second struggle for independence,” “Gov. Shelby . . . immortalized by his valor in two desperate struggles against tyranny,” “our land and naval heroes,” and [ 27 ]

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“the late war.” The 1798 and 1816 celebrations and the toasts offered at each make evident the process by which Americans crafted a national identity. The Revolutionary era produced images and ideals that Americans immediately embraced as symbols of a nascent nationalism. Washington, Franklin, liberty, and the Constitution’s first ten amendments flowed from toast makers’ tongues at the earliest holiday celebrations. Of particular note was the emergence of a national iconography peopled as much by military men as by the Founding Fathers. Thereafter, the United States’ trials and triumphs produced new images and individuals that either supplemented or supplanted the earlier subjects of holiday rhetoric. In Kentucky the toasting ritual began in the late eighteenth century when speakers honored individuals with established national reputations. Men such as Washington and Franklin reigned as icons in the American psyche even before the Virginia general had orchestrated Cornwallis’s defeat in 1781. The ensuing years only added to their reputations for virtue and self-sacrifice, enveloping them in an aura of myth and fable. Toasts to Washington were split between those extolling his military prowess and those praising his civic virtue. Washington the battlefield commander, “our conductor through the disastrous period of the revolution,” collected accolades equal to Washington the president, whose “heart was the seal of Virtue, his soul the resting place of sublimity.” Holiday speakers presented Washington to their audiences as the embodiment of the ideal American, a figure worthy of imitation but beyond the reach of mere mortals. “Immortal Washington,” ran a salute in 1812, “to imitate his example, the highest virtue, and noblest ambition of every Freeman.” He had become “the saviour of his country.” In contrast to the bifurcation of the public’s collective memory of Washington, Franklin achieved his mythical status primarily for his role as America’s preeminent sage, scholar, and statesman. The man who “snatched the lightening from the Heavens and the sceptre from the hands of tyrants” was also saluted as “the practical philosopher, the useful statesman, the friend of the rights and liberties of mankind.” By the middle of the nineteenth century, Americans had firmly established Washington and Franklin as national heroes, and community celebrations had played a crucial role in the creation and conveyance of these mythological images.

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Additional elements of American mythology were not so quickly or easily established. Revolutionary leaders such as Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, unable to escape the brambles of partisan politics, did not achieve the status of American icons until the last vestiges of the first party struggle withered after the War of 1812. Toast makers in Kentucky first acknowledged Jefferson in 1803, albeit for his position as the nation’s chief executive. For the next six years, partisanship colored expressions of praise for Jefferson. Scott County residents heard in 1804: “Thomas Jefferson and the victorious republicans . . . have cherished and now put into execution the divine principle of ’76.” Not until Jefferson retired from the public stage and withdrew to his beloved Monticello did the people begin to hear of him as the embodiment of the Revolution’s ideals and spirit. He then became the “immortal author of the Declaration of Independence” and “the brightest living ornament of the age.” Audiences were told that Jefferson, like Washington, lived a life worthy of imitation. He was “a Cincinnatus in republican virtue,” Lexington celebrants were told, “a bright example to the present and after ages.” Madison, like his presidential predecessor, remained entangled in partisan politics until he retired to civilian life. Through 1816, party inferences, although overwhelmingly positive, characterized holiday salutes to Madison, a man “firm in republican virtue.” With the demise of the Federalist Party and Madison’s withdrawal from public life in 1816, July Fourth speakers recast Madison’s image from the preeminent Republican to virtuous Founding Father. The “artificer of the Constitution” took his place alongside Washington, Franklin, and Jefferson in America’s pantheon of civil heroes, or as a Georgetown toastmaster called it, the “American Temple of Fame.” Despite their immense popularity, the three Virginians and Franklin were not the only Founding Fathers immortalized at local celebrations. As they lifted their glasses, toastmasters taught their listeners to revere the names of John Hancock, Sam and John Adams, Gen. Nathanael Greene, Patrick Henry, and others. Although none of these revolutionaries attained the fame and notoriety of the Big Four—Washington, Franklin, Jefferson, and Madison—at Fourth of July celebrations Americans learned of their sacrifices and contributions to freedom and independence. Their popularity among toast makers declined slightly as

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the nation approached mid-century, while the renown of the Big Four remained constant. No one could challenge the popularity of the men whom Americans had transformed into the deities of a national religion, the personifications of a national identity. The popularity of the most famous Founding Fathers was rivaled if not equaled by a collection of mostly anonymous men who fought the British in the Revolution, battled Indians at Fallen Timbers, and died at the River Raisin in 1813. Time and again, Kentucky toastmasters eulogized local heroes of earlier wars, reminded listeners of decisive battles both won and lost, and recited a roll call of officers who led the community’s citizen-soldiers into battle. Audiences received a continuous education in their state’s and their nation’s military past. The earliest lessons taught at holiday events emphasized the “Patriots of ’76,” the men who had “died for the liberties of their country.” Residents of Woodford County who gathered at the Cave Spring near Versailles in 1809 heard a toast maker praise the “Heroes of ’76” and admonish them to regard the old warriors as “monuments of American valor and patriotism.” Similar messages were conveyed throughout the region until the outbreak of hostilities in 1812, when another generation of soldiers marched into battle. Of special significance was the 1813 River Raisin massacre, where a combined force of British and Indians defeated Gen. James Winchester’s army of eight hundred and fifty Americans, mostly Kentucky volunteers. Exacerbating the high number of battle deaths (three hundred Americans killed) was the Indians’ execution of thirty captured U.S. prisoners. The loss of these men gave rise to toasts of both mourning and retribution. Five months after the battle, the July Fourth celebration in Frankfort memorialized the “brave, but unfortunate Kentuckians, massacred at river Raisin—Their lamentable fate is a proof to the world, that British honour is as treacherous as savage barbarism is shocking to humanity!” During the war years and after, other battles attracted the attention of toast makers, but none to the degree of the Raisin. The battle cry “Remember the Raisin!” echoed at July Fourth celebrations for years after the war’s conclusion. Community rituals such as toasting, as Jean-Jacques Rousseau once observed, reminded citizens “of their forefathers’ deeds and hardships and virtues and triumphs, stirred their hearts, set them on fire with the spirit of emulation, and tied them tightly to the fatherland. . . .” Remembrances of the Raisin, along with the other ideas, symbols, and [ 30 ]

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rituals experienced on Independence Days, Washington’s Birthdays, and other militia events, engendered among audiences a sense of national identity. The anniversaries that citizen-soldiers commemorated and the men who were honored contributed to the development of nationalism because each anniversary and honoree was associated with an element of a shared American culture. From a statewide July Fourth celebration to the splendor of a reception for Lafayette, militia gatherings legitimated a constellation of ideas and individuals that encouraged an attachment to the nation and its past. Given the limitations of early nineteenth-century communications, community events offered a forum to convey information to a large, even illiterate, assembly of people. Moreover, newspapers frequently published accounts of the holiday toasts and speeches, thereby reaching an even larger audience. Like Rousseau, political scientist Sidney Verba makes the point that the “central commitment to the symbols of nationhood” originates in “periodic ceremonies and collective events that allow the members of the society mutually to reinforce each other’s commitment by collective activities.” Whenever the militia mustered, crowds consumed a steady diet of patriotic ideology and icons; a national identity was the offspring, born of shared American ideals and heroes. A burgeoning nationalism did not preclude the concurrent development of a regional identity, a second consequence of militia gatherings and events. Well before statehood in 1792, Kentuckians recognized the unique environment of the West. At one of the earliest recorded celebrations of the Fourth in 1788, two salutes revealed an emerging western identity: “May the Atlantic States be just, the Western States be Free and both be happy,” and more telling, “The Western world, perpetual Union, on principles of equality, or amicable Separation.” Nearly two decades later, at an 1804 celebration of the acquisition of Louisiana, the Western world had become more precisely defined, as is demonstrated by this toast offered in Scott County: “The three western states, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Ohio . . . unanimous in their patriotism, harmonious in their endeavors to accelerate the growing importance of the western states.” Even as mid-century approached and the “West” was beginning to pass them by, Kentuckians maintained their regional identity, toasting “the heroes of the West—The monuments of their fame are to be found in every battle field on which their heroism has been displayed. Posterity will admire, and, when necessary, emulate their gallantry.” [ 31 ]

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Militiamen found occasions to celebrate Kentucky itself, including statewide jubilees in 1840 and 1841 to mark Kentucky’s first settlement and in 1842 to celebrate the state’s fiftieth anniversary. In May 1840 militia companies in Madison County organized a statewide militia encampment to celebrate the anniversary of Kentucky’s first settlement at Fort Boonesborough. An announcement published prior to the citizen-soldiers’ arrival noted that “the military, who are ever ready to turn out on all proper occasions, will be in attendance by hundreds, and perhaps by thousands.” Companies from Lexington, Winchester, Paris, Richmond, Frankfort, and Louisville attended this three-day event and joined in “Parades, Religious Services, Orations, Dinners, &c.” After arriving and setting up camp, the various troops formed ranks to “celebrate the day by Military services.” The spectacle of nine companies parading together was surely a source of fireside stories for years to come. The following day, being the Sabbath, was “dedicated to Religious services,” and a “number of eminent divines of the different religious denominations” preached to those in attendance. The final day’s activities returned to military exercises, and the weekend concluded with a final dinner and oration. Despite the emphasis on the militia and its martial skills, organizers strongly encouraged the general public to attend, especially “the ladies, the soldiers of the Revolution and the last war, the old settlers of the State and their descendants . . . and all strangers within the same.” The Madison County celebration proved so successful that a similar encampment was planned for the following year in the Mercer County town of Harrodsburg. Arrangements began early for the June gathering of militiamen. In March two officers inquired of Governor Robert Letcher about the availability of weapons for their company. “Your excellency is doubtless aware,” wrote the Harrodsburg captains, “that arrangements are being made to celebrate the first settlement of Kentucky. . . . We have gotten up a handsome Company, well uniformed, and lack nothing but about 40 or 50 Colt Rifles to make the Central Guards one of the finest companies in the state. . . . We have some pride that old HBurg should be represented at the celebration.” In June eight other volunteer companies from the Bluegrass Region joined the Central Guards in Harrodsburg and commemorated the state’s early settlement. All in attendance “displayed a spirit of liberality and courtesy . . . worthy of the highest praise.” [ 32 ]

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The year 1842 marked the fiftieth anniversary of Kentucky’s statehood, and plans were made to commemorate the occasion, this time in Lexington. As before, organizers began early to allow “the Military companies . . . time to make arrangements for their encampment.” The celebration differed little from the previous years’ musters, running for six days in June with “the citizens of Kentucky generally . . . invited to attend.” The spectacle of the region’s combined volunteer companies again created the most interest and gave the militiamen an opportunity to practice their skills before an audience of friends and neighbors, allowing civilians to witness “in one body, a specimen of Kentucky chivalry.” Just as nationalistic sentiments found encouragement in receptions for and toasts to the nation’s political and military heroes, militia parades and celebrations for “specimens of Kentucky chivalry” furthered a regional identification. Companies frequently provided military escorts, gun salutes, and officers to officiate at public dinners and inauguration ceremonies for the state’s governors. From the 1790s to the 1830s, Kentuckians learned of the heroism, valor, and sacrifices of Woodford County resident Gen. Charles Scott. Known by neighbors as both a “soldier and patriot” and a “friend and brother,” Scott exemplified the ideals of service and sacrifice to one’s state and country. He fought with George Washington in the Revolution, enduring Valley Forge, Trenton, Monmouth, and Charleston, and endeared himself to his neighbors by serving during the Indian wars of the 1790s, most notably leading fifteen hundred Kentucky volunteers at Fallen Timbers in 1794. As a civilian he served as a presidential elector in four different elections and attained the Kentucky governorship in 1808, serving one term. During the first sixty years of Kentucky’s existence as a state, Scott’s name was a common fixture in celebration toasts. Even before he gained notoriety as governor, his reputation as “a soldier of ’76, a terror to our enemies, and a friend to his country” was firmly established among holiday audiences. Exchanging his saddle for the governor’s chair in 1808, Scott remained popular among Kentuckians, who held a high degree of respect and admiration for both the man and his civic virtue. One Lexington speaker praised Scott as a man whose “valor, patriotism and integrity are indelibly impressed on the hearts of his countrymen.” After his death in 1813, toast makers continued to honor the “hero of Kentucky,” recounting to later generations his contribution to the growth and protection of both the state and the nation. [ 33 ]

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Nearly as popular as General Scott, Col. Isaac Shelby enjoyed militia escorts and honorary toasts for years. A hero of the Battle of King’s Mountain during the Revolution, he became Kentucky’s first governor in 1792, having helped draft the state’s constitution. After serving one term, he returned to the office sixteen years later, when he was called from retirement in 1812 to lead the state in war against Great Britain and its Native American allies. Despite being a rather advanced sixtythree years old, he organized and led a force of four thousand Kentucky volunteers to a rendezvous with Gen. William Henry Harrison’s army, which defeated the British at the Battle of the Thames. Only after reelection to his second term as governor, and especially following the victory at the Thames River, did audiences learn of their governor’s contributions to the Revolution and the subsequent war with Britain. The “old soldier and tried patriot,” listeners were told in 1813 at Maxwell’s Spring in Lexington, “merits the confidence of his countrymen.” He was, assured another speaker, “a genuine Kentuckian in principle and practice; immortalized by his valor in two desperate struggles against tyranny.” One of Shelby’s subordinates in the second war against Britain also gained a measure of fame as holiday celebrants learned of his military accomplishments. Col. Richard M. Johnson followed Shelby northward in 1813, leading a regiment of mounted Kentucky riflemen at the Thames. He and his troops performed in an exemplary fashion. Johnson purportedly killed the Indian Chief Tecumseh, ensuring an American victory. Although severely wounded during the battle, Johnson returned to his seat in Congress, a position he won in 1807 and maintained despite his participation in the Thames campaign. Upon his return from battle in 1814, he dined at the expense of Lexingtonians, and the passage of several decades did little to diminish his renown. In 1836 the Nicholasville Rifle Guards greeted Congressman Johnson upon his arrival in their city, and five years later, when Johnson returned to the Bluegrass after serving a term as Martin Van Buren’s vice president, he received a similar reception. According to the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, “the Georgetown Artillery, several carriages, and a large cavalcade of citizens on horseback, proceeded to the first turnpike gate on the Frankfort road, where they met the Colonel and escorted him into Georgetown under a salute from the cannon of the Artillery Company.” Throughout his life he remained best known for his contribution at the Thames; even a term [ 34 ]

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as vice president could not supersede his military reputation. Holiday speakers reminded celebrants of Johnson’s civil as well as military service to the commonweal: “The nation has appreciated his merits as a statesman and soldier, let us not forget him.” Scott, Shelby, and Johnson lived on as toast makers’ favorites for decades, but other local military figures also achieved a degree of fame. At virtually every community celebration, the public toasted a captain or major of the neighborhood militia, especially those who had performed admirably or had not returned from battle. Popular figures included frontiersman George Rogers Clark: although seen “in the field no more . . . found in the hearts of [his] countrymen.” Gen. John Adair, one of Jackson’s lieutenants at the Battle of New Orleans, visited Hopkinsville in 1820, where “Captain Hays’s company paraded and . . . gave him a salute and escorted him to this lodging—A field piece and several rounds from the Infantry were fired.” Especially admired was William Henry Harrison, “the military favorite of his western brethren” and a “brave and intrepid commander.” Recollections of these military heroes and the battles in which they fought, from the Revolution to the Indian wars to the second clash with Britain, made their way into the collective memory each time neighbors toasted their service and sacrifice at community gatherings. Even less famous men received the militia’s acknowledgment for their service and sacrifice. Militiamen presided at a public dinner in 1812 that honored John P. Boyd, a Massachusetts colonel whose Fourth Infantry Regiment of regulars formed the rallying point for the militia at the Battle of Tippecanoe. At a similar affair in 1814 they saluted a Colonel Lewis and a Colonel Madison, both recently returned prisoners of war. Companies also turned out to honor other units of citizen-soldiers, as did Capt. Louis Back’s “Rough and Ready Rifles” in 1847, when they mustered to welcome home the Louisville Legion from its campaign in the Mexican War. Although Colonels Boyd, Lewis, and Madison did not attain widespread notoriety, to their immediate neighbors and kin these warriors were heroes just the same, equal in their eyes to Harrison and Jackson. The receptions and parades that welcomed them home celebrated their character and accomplishments, and allowed ordinary people to create a regional identity as Kentuckians. Such expressions of regionalism could carry multiple meanings. They could be the voice of a proud people, extolling their unique culture, or [ 35 ]

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they could be the early grumblings of a discontented minority, slipping toward instability or, worse still, disunion. In most cases celebrations of a regional association posed no threat to the national welfare; in fact, they often enhanced rather than diminished ties to the rest of the country. Fully aware that their toasts not only would be heard by local participants but also would be reprinted in newspapers and read by Americans across the nation, Kentucky militia officers and politicians used such pronouncements to demonstrate that even on the edge of civilization they were just as American as citizens elsewhere. Celebrations of the Louisiana Purchase made evident the conflation of regionalism and nationalism. At a public dinner in Scott County, where Col. Richard M. Johnson served as president and the militia fired an exclamation of gunfire to every salute, toasts included “Citizens of Louisiana, we embrace you as brothers,” “the 17 confederated States of America, and territorial appendages,” and “the free and uninterrupted navigation of the Mississippi—the highway to national wealth.” Even stridently partisan toasts, such as “Success to Republicanism—Federalism quake and tremble, the day of judgement is at hand,” affirmed that Kentuckians were not outcasts on a savage and uncivilized frontier but were part of the national political family, even as they cultivated a regional self-identity. A third effect of militia celebrations and events was the development of a sense of community and a bond of neighborliness. Individuals from every corner of the community lined the streets to watch the militia parade, no matter the day’s ideological or political underpinnings. Like martial pied pipers, citizen-soldiers led crowds to barbecues where all broke bread. Such camaraderie also found expression at other events that emphasized the fun, fellowship, and novelty of a militia performance. Muster days, often more like a bacchanalian fete or martial burlesque than a day of serious military training, were anticipated events throughout the United States. Relatively small company musters, involving approximately fifty to eighty-five militiamen, usually attracted “a number of people and all happy,” as Capt. Robert McAfee described a muster of his Harrodsburg command in 1808. The much larger regimental musters that could place eight companies on parade demanded extensive planning and preparation but promised a memorable event. The scale and activities of an 1809 muster held in Lexington resembled the expansive 1842 July Fourth celebration at “Camp Scott” in Georgetown. Crowds gathered to witness the military parades, par[ 36 ]

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take “of an excellent Barbecue,” and enjoy the traditional toasts. With citizen-soldiers leading the crowds, all shared the day’s experiences, if not the same table. If an official muster was not in the offing, some militiamen found creative reasons to barbecue, as the Lexington Light Infantry did in 1839. The Lexington company first mustered in 1789, when as one member recalled, “The war whoop of the savage was heard on every hill and through every valley of our State, and when the cold-blooded butchery of the wives and children of our fathers was a daily and hourly occurrence.” Company members served in the subsequent Indian wars and fought at the Battle of the River Raisin in 1813. The year 1839 marked their fiftieth year of service, an occasion they celebrated with a September encampment of parades, barbecues, and speeches. Other volunteer companies from the Bluegrass Region, including the Louisville Guards, converged at Maxwell’s Spring on the outskirts of Lexington, joining crowds of civilians to salute the Light Infantry’s “military talent and chivalrous etiquette.” All in attendance “dined Bountifully,” which no doubt contributed to the “great hilarity and good feeling [that] prevailed.” On another occasion the riflemen of Major Chinn’s command appeared “at a Barbecue, given at a squirrel hunt on Cane Run, four miles from [Lexington],” where they joined in the search for squirrels and participated in the fellowship that followed, firing “a round at each toast.” Evidence does not reveal the damage, if any, the stalkers inflicted on the local squirrel population. Militia companies also marked special events in community life. In July 1802 the Lexington Light Infantry helped the city celebrate the repeal of taxes on stills and distilled spirits. The jubilee began in the evening, when the company “paraded and fired seventeen vollies of musquetry—the bell rang a joyful peal—the bonfires blazed—shouts rent the air,” and no doubt revelers consumed respectable quantities of tax-free spirits. Two years later the militia again turned out to honor the acquisition of the Louisiana Territory. Even internal improvements drew out the militia. The groundbreaking ceremony for the excavation of a canal near Chillicothe in 1825 attracted governors, local politicians, and “strangers of distinction.” The ceremonies began around noon with “a national salute of 24 guns, from three pieces of artillery, belonging to some of the volunteer companies.” Dignitaries performed the ceremony “under a salute of artil[ 37 ]

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lery and musketry, amid the cheers of the surrounding multitude.” One reporter, describing a crowd of approximately ten thousand, let slip a little hometown pride: “The volunteer companies, consisting of three of artillery, three of cavalry, two of riflemen, and two of light infantry, made a handsome display; and without derogating from the merits of the rest, it is but justice to say, that the Chillicothe Independent Blues, by their soldierly deportment, and strict discipline, excited the admiration of all present.” Just a few years later, in 1831, the arrival of steam-powered transportation elicited the same response from citizensoldiers. Construction of the Lexington and Ohio Railroad brought out Captain Hunt’s Artillery Company and Captain Neet’s Rifle Guards, who marched to the sounds of a “Military Band of Music” to christen the line’s first crossties and iron rails. The militia’s participation made each of these events a celebration of progress and community consensus. More curious was the Lexington militia’s 1810 venture into an arena not usually associated with military organizations: the theater. When an attempt “to raise money by subscription to purchase the necessary arms” failed, Lexington’s part-time soldiers donned a different type of uniform and staged productions of dramas, tragedies, and comedies, hoping they would attract “the liberal patronage of the citizens.” Only a month into their thespian campaign, however, the militiamen’s stage careers suffered a strategic defeat. “The profits of their last performance,” the Lexington Kentucky Gazette reported, “were but little better than a fifth part of what the society intended to raise at their commencement.” Thus concluded the militia’s sortie into show business. As volunteer units began to replace the enrolled companies following the War of 1812, competitions among citizen-soldiers offered theater of another kind and further strengthened community bonds. In 1816 companies from the Bluegrass Region converged on Lexington for a test of marksmanship, with the prize of a horse awaiting the best shot. The officers who organized the event, ostensibly for reasons of greater import than simple fun and festivity, hoped the competition would excite “a spirit of emulation . . . amongst the gentlemen composing their command.” Eight years later the Lexington Light Infantry battled the Lexington Cadets in “a contest for fame” based on “which company performed infantry evolutions in the most Military manner.” In 1836, when Texas Revolution fever afflicted much of the country, the Citizen

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Volunteer Artillery of Lexington also held a public target practice “for the purpose of firing at a target of Santa Anna—the best shot will be entitled to wear the cross, 1 year—the 2d best, the half moon—and the 3d, the Star.” Whether holidays, receptions, squirrel hunts, or the theater, such events nurtured the transformation of individuals into a community. No matter the occasion, when the militia mustered, men and women, rich and poor, and black and white all joined in a celebration of community. Even predominantly nationalistic occasions like Independence Day, as historian Don Doyle has demonstrated, “further reinforced the ideals of local unity and common purpose.” Family and friends gathered to break bread and watch their fathers, brothers, and sons meld into the singularity of a parading company of militiamen, a symbolic joining of the many into one. The atmosphere of comity, in most cases aided by the social lubricant of alcohol, produced the “harmonious and good feelings” that characterized so many celebrations. Here was a rare opportunity for neighbors, separated by distance and distinctions of class, race, and gender, to join in an atmosphere of amity and fellowship that strengthened the tenuous bonds of community. The harmony and nostalgia at a July Fourth gathering motivated a Lexington Kentucky Gazette writer to comment that “harmonious and good feelings . . . appeared upon every countenance.” A community spirit prevailed: “The invited guests, according to modern parlance, would be deemed heterogeneous, but they with the whole assemblage seemed to fall in side by side, with a full determination, that however we might have slight family jars, in the cause of the country, and a determination to support the government, no one would yield to his neighbor.” A final consequence of militia gatherings for local communities was the reinforcement of social hierarchies. Events that fostered national, regional, and local identities masked a hierarchical substrate of class, gender, and race. During the frontier era the militia, as the initial source of authority and stability, had provided the framework upon which emerging society constructed its social relationships. Militia officers exercised considerable influence, even as political and economic leaders began to build their reputations. The men who commanded local companies symbolized order and deference, as Col. William Russell reminded his men in 1808: “Your colonel glories in a soldier that is orderly and

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obedient, and . . . at the same time abhors disorder and confusion.” The well-ordered ranks of militiamen served as a model for a well-ordered, hierarchical, deferential community. Militia events underscored the elevated status and influence of both militia and civilian leaders by providing them a platform from which to address the community at large. As significant as the words spoken and ideas conveyed was the selection of the men who spoke; access to the stage equaled access to power, and only the elite found the podium open. Historian Len Travers notes that town leaders “regulated the ritual matrix and many of the ritual forms” of celebrations, and these public events “contained socializing messages encoded in the fireworks, stage productions, songs, and food.” Similarly, parades gave militia officers and elected officials another opportunity to turn disorder into order, superficial familiarity into structured hierarchy. While parades involved everyone as either participants or onlookers, town leaders, the militia, ministers, and veterans filled the most prominent positions in the order of procession. Others joined in, but they either followed at the end of the parade or stood on the sidelines as anonymous spectators. Lisa Tolbert, in her study of community development in Tennessee, makes explicit the significance of parades and other community gatherings: “These events helped to sort out differences among town residents by reinforcing hierarchies of status, gender, and race. Thus, public ceremonies were integral to the construction of town-centered identities because they made distinctions among town residents.” One distinction that community leaders sought to minimize, but only to a point, was the class differences among white men. In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, as voting rights expanded to include non-landholders and holiday celebrations became less elitist and more democratic by including white males from all social ranks, an identifiable white male identity emerged. Militia participation strengthened that alliance. All white men had the opportunity to join the fraternity of a militia company and share the camaraderie of a group affiliation, and cementing these bonds of fraternity was the practice of officer elections. For the enrolled militia, tradition and statute allowed the rank and file to issue orders of their own by electing company officers. Typically, deference determined the election winner, as men of wealth and prominence filled the positions of command. For the later volunteer companies, election of junior officers continued, but because of these units’ [ 40 ]

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exclusivity, fraternal quality, and members’ greater social and economic homogeneity, interaction between officers and privates may well have had a more egalitarian tone. Each case, however, reinforced the ties of brotherhood. The toast-making ritual further reaffirmed the participants’ commitment not only to their nation and region but also to each other as white men, thereby diminishing potential class resentment and constraining violent expressions of disaffection. The subjects of the toasts, typically the Founding Fathers and military men, and the rituals associated with holiday celebrations were indicative of a white male world view, a psychological system of values and beliefs that created and reinforced the hegemonic culture of nineteenth-century America. With each toast the men who occupied positions of civil or military authority conveyed a message that reinforced the prevailing social order, offered a model of behavior for other white males, educated audiences with a narrowly defined version of America’s past, and legitimated the nationalistic ideals they deemed appropriate for American society. Decade after decade, a clear and consistent message resonated from stages and speakers’ platforms at holiday celebrations—the Founding Fathers and the heroes who fought America’s battles were the personification of America and its virtues. For white American males, these men were the model after which to pattern their lives. Recall “Immortal Washington—to imitate his example, the highest virtue and noblest ambition of every Freeman,” and Jefferson, “a bright example to the present and after ages.” Toasts firmly established the martial qualities of bravery, valor, and honor as masculine characteristics worthy of emulation, again promoting Washington and a cast of war heroes as role models. Viewed in another way, exclusion defined this white male unity as much as inclusion did. When dinner was over and the time came for toasting American ideals like Jefferson’s tribute to equality, white males of every class joined to close the doors to women and African Americans. Even the perfunctory nods to the “American [or Kentucky] Fair” carried greater implications for male behavior than for female. Toast makers admonished women to bestow their charms only on the country’s most deserving males, those who lived up to the ideals of republicanism, patriotism, and civic virtue. A Winchester speaker instructed the “Fair Daughters of America, in their choice of protectors, [to] give a [ 41 ]

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preference to men of virtuous and republican principles,” while Lexington women were counseled that “the coward [should] never be blessed by their smiles.” Thus the ritual of toast making reaffirmed the participants’ commitment to the nation and to their common characteristic of white manhood. Nonetheless, even white male unity had its limits. Poor white men marched in the parades and joined their officers and town elders with a cheer and swallow as each toast was read, but none ever found himself initiating the ritual. Such was the exclusive province of the better sort. Despite the increasingly egalitarian nature of American society, social deference remained alive and well. Women found themselves pushed further toward the margins of the public sphere. Their participation rarely went beyond that of spectator, and even that role occasionally was unavailable. Women normally looked on at parades and listened to the day’s oration, but the practice of toast making was most often a male domain, and women were excused before the rounds began. The customary acknowledgment of the “American Fair” and the occasional reminder of women’s domestic responsibilities further emphasized women’s distinct and subordinate position. Despite their exclusion from the toast-making ritual, women were essential at ceremonies and celebrations. Their presence—and especially their approval—helped create the perception of a unified, virtuous society and confirmed the status of all involved. Even further removed from celebration activities were African Americans, who made up on average slightly more than 21 percent of Kentucky’s population from 1790 to 1850. Most were slaves whose lack of social standing severely limited their involvement in community activities. Direct participation was out of the question, and following Toussaint L’Ouverture’s success in Haiti in 1791, even blacks in the North were increasingly excluded from celebrations. The attendance of African Americans as simple observers is difficult to document, but in the South the nature of the slave system produced an integrated public sphere, where slaves were the silent and all but invisible shadows of Southern life. One can hardly imagine a Fourth of July parade or celebration without the faces of black men, women, and children peering out of the crowd. Like the presence of women, the presence of African Americans made explicit the structure and order of the community. It was always clear who occupied the bottom rungs of the social ladder and who maintained control at the top. [ 42 ]

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These hierarchies of class, gender, and race were the manifestation of the desire for a well-ordered society. As historian David Waldstreicher puts it, “Order was the order of the day.” Americans wished to create a hierarchical republic of virtuous citizens, and that required the development of a national identity, a commitment to institutions of local authority, and a respect for stability and order, all on prominent display whenever the militia mustered. When the militia formed ranks for a public funeral, the consequences for communities and their citizens were little different from the flurry of activity during celebrations. In July 1826, word of Thomas Jefferson’s and John Adams’s deaths reached the Bluegrass Region just as Kentuckians learned that colonel and former governor Isaac Shelby had also passed away. In the span of fourteen days, the nation had lost two of its most revered Founding Fathers and Kentucky suffered the death of its first governor and hero of two wars. Lexington trustees declared a day of mourning that began at eleven o’clock in front of the Grand Masonic Hall. A funeral procession formed, escorted by the Fayette Hussars, the Light Artillery Cadets, the Lexington Light Infantry, the Fayette Rifle Corps, and a number of other companies from Fayette County. Following the militiamen were the clergy, who preceded the symbolic biers of Adams and Jefferson. “Twenty-four Misses dressed in white, with white veils and suitable badges representing the twenty-four States of the Union” fell into line behind the coffins. Next came the catafalque of Shelby, also followed by “a female representing Kentucky, clothed in white with an appropriate badge.” The remainder of the procession included war veterans, additional militia officers, and prominent local residents, with “Citizens and Strangers, four abreast” bringing up the rear. The cortege proceeded from the Masonic Hall to the Episcopal Church, where mourners heard prayers and eulogies accompanied by an organ dirge. Upon the conclusion of the service, the militia companies returned to the public square, where they were dismissed. Nearby Russellville marked the deaths with a procession of townspeople led by the Russellville Artillery Company, their left arms adorned with crape. The militia’s 1826 memorial ceremonies drew upon death rituals and funeral tradition established by the participants’ forefathers. Nearly three decades earlier, in 1799, Washington’s death initiated Lexington’s first memorial procession for a national figure. As in the later commemoration for Jefferson and Adams, the militia companies, with arms [ 43 ]

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reversed, led the cortege and were followed by dignitaries, the clergy, professors from nearby Transylvania University, and local citizens. An 1834 procession for Washington’s close friend the Marquis de Lafayette outdid the parade for Adams and Jefferson. According to the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, the assemblage “was considerably the largest procession we have ever had in our city, covering a space of a mile.” Seventeen militia companies mustered, representing seven counties and towns in the Lexington vicinity. The ceremonies “were every way worthy of the occasion.” Kentucky’s governors, many of whom had served as militia officers, also received the honor of a military escort to their final resting place. In 1816, when Governor George Madison died in office, Frankfort’s numerous volunteer troops escorted the body to the cemetery and provided six pallbearers. After they lowered the coffin into the ground, “three rounds were fired over the grave by the military.” Earlier in the day “there were discharges from the Artillery every half hour and during the procession every minute.” Enough noise, one might imagine, to wake the dead. Daniel Boone, a former officer in the Virginia militia, received a military escort when he and his wife were interred in Frankfort in 1845. An estimated fifteen to twenty thousand spectators and eight companies of militia turned out to pay their respects to Kentucky’s most famous pioneer. The militia paid homage to more than the rich and famous. Citizensoldiers mustered to mark the passing of town leaders, men from their own ranks, and family members. Comrades who fell in battle received special attention. In 1813 Lexington’s volunteer companies formed a procession as “a testimony of their sorrow and regret for the loss” of their brothers-in-arms at the Battle of the River Raisin. Years later the return of casualties from the Mexican War also elicited commemorative parades in Kentucky towns. Lt. Col. Henry Clay, Jr., was perhaps the most prominent Kentuckian killed during the war, and when his body arrived in Louisville, an honor guard of volunteer companies met the corpse with gun salutes and their flags “clothed in mourning.” Clay, along with other Kentuckians who fell at the Battle of Buena Vista, was interred in the Frankfort Cemetery on July 30, 1847, amid a gathering of people from throughout the state, including eighteen militia companies representing the communities of the returning dead. Kentuckians across the state joined in similar expressions of sorrow as the remains of militiamen returned from Mexico. [ 44 ]

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Kentucky’s memorial processions, like those that occurred throughout the nation during the early nineteenth century, served communities in a fashion similar to celebrations. Neighbors put aside daily work and made their way to town squares, initiating the transformative process that fused individual farmers, artisans, and shopkeepers into a unified community. Just as fetes joined people in an expression of pride, comity, and happiness, public funerals provided an opportunity to join hands, figuratively if not literally, in a mutual expression of grief and reflection. Marking the deaths of the nation’s founders—a Jefferson, an Adams, or a Lafayette—rekindled the spirit of nationalism that was born in 1776 and was nurtured over the years into a maturing national identity. Similarly, Isaac Shelby, Henry Clay, Jr., and the less famous created regional pride and unity among mourners. Organizers of the Russellville commemoration for Jefferson, Adams, and Shelby promoted these shared identities when they requested that “the citizens of all classes suspend their labor from the hours of 11 o’clock a.m. to 3 o’clock p.m.” in order to mark their common loss (emphasis added). Over the parading citizen-soldiers and tributes to the dead hovered the spirits of nationalism, regionalism, and local pride. In addition, the rituals of public funerals communicated the same implicit social messages as the celebrations. The militia again provided the model for order and deference, and the hierarchical ladder, with its complex ordering of class, gender, and race, made its way from church service to graveside. Militia officers and town elders were perched on the top rungs, and militiamen, farmers, and artisans claimed the middle, with women, children, and slaves clinging to the bottom or watching from the periphery. Although the day’s tone was solemnity rather than celebration, nationalism and community brought everyone together. The conversion of individual persons—each with their own personality and experiences, their own social, economic, political, and ethnic background—into a people who share a similar ideology or identity is a cumulative process combining independent events and encounters. Each isolated experience or exchange provides little lasting effect, creating only tenuous lines of association and attachment. Thus a single celebration of the Fourth, an occasional dinner for Henry Clay, or a funeral procession for Isaac Shelby in and of itself held only marginal significance. When understood as a collective process, however, such [ 45 ]

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community gatherings did indeed create and reinforce the multiplicity of identities shared by nineteenth-century Americans. In 1788 a Providence, Rhode Island, newspaperman captured the power of community celebrations in this era to create a common identity: The establishment of any particular form of government, is a matter of sentiment among a free people, and the strength of that government depends on the good opinion people in general have of it; it is therefore good policy, and a sure mark of patriotism and public virtue, to endeavor as much as possible that all ranks and orders of people should be pleased with, and should support it, and nothing has a greater tendency to this than for the people of all conditions to assemble together, at certain times, to join in the celebration of the government under which they live. The intention of such a celebration is to conciliate and unite, and by no means to offend and divide.

Patriotic celebrations of the Fourth of July and Washington’s Birthday created a day of spectacle, excitement, and social education only occasionally seen by nineteenth-century Americans. The pageantry of the militia, the extravagant uniforms, the shock of artillery fire felt deep in the chest, and plentiful food and drink attracted people from far and wide. In addition, these events offered one of the few vehicles for the dissemination of information to a broad audience in a pre–mass media age. Speakers at holiday commemorations not only addressed an educated minority but also reached the illiterate and isolated of society, those excluded by fate from the world of newspapers, broadsides, and political pamphlets. The men who organized and choreographed the community gatherings, and especially those who controlled access to the rostrum, created and conveyed their understanding of America’s past and their choices of the images and individuals that symbolized American values and ideals. According to contemporary writers, toast making and its associated rituals accurately reflected public sentiment. An editorial that appeared in the Trenton True American and later was reprinted in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette made the following observation: The toasts drank at the commemoration of the Declaration of Independence, are generally regarded as a correct exposition of public opinion. . . . Considering them in this light, we have been much pleased with

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the most of those. . . . Devotion to national independence and individual liberty, and a determination to maintain them—Gratitude to the Heroes and Sages of the Revolution and a desire to honor and imitate them—Love for our constitution, and a resolution to perpetuate it—Confidence in our government and an intention to support it—A sense of the importance of Domestic Manufactures, and a disposition to patronize and encourage them . . . a willingness to suspend trade, rather than carry it on under taxes and duties, restrictions and impositions, at the arbitrary will of foreign tyrants—are all manifested, with remarkable unanimity, in the toasts which have been received.

Three years later the Lexington Kentucky Gazette’s editor made a similar observation following Lexington’s annual celebration of the nation’s birth. Writing in 1814, in the midst of the continuing war with Great Britain, the editor commented that “the sentiments which appear in the Gazette to-day, in the form of toasts and resolutions . . . are expressive of the feelings and opinions of Kentuckians generally. As such, and in every point of view, they are highly interesting. They speak the feelings of patriotism and the principles of attachment to republican freedoms.” The people’s republican affections revealed their shared identities as Americans, as Kentuckians, and as members of a community where militia gatherings sustained concord and unity. Despite the camaraderie and atmosphere of familiarity prevalent at public militia events, all in attendance knew their place in the social hierarchy. The symbolism of the militia organizations themselves provided an ordered and deferential model for individual observers and society as a whole. Well-formed ranks on parade and the chain of command presented an image of subordination and respect for authority. The membership of militia companies reminded onlookers that white males occupied the top rungs of power and prestige—no blacks or females need apply. The ritual of toast making confirmed these distinctions, shutting out the marginal while reminding white males of their bond of race and gender. Unity, however, maintained its own boundaries; the exclusive club of white males had its chain of command too. Thus, in addition to being America’s first line of defense, citizen-soldiers and their public presence created multiple shared identities and reinforced the hierarchical nature of nineteenth-century American society.

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In the early republic, Americans had yet to establish professional police forces that could maintain civil order or put down insurrections. Communities instead looked to sheriffs, justices of the peace, and town watchmen, but when circumstances required greater force, they issued a call for the militia. Citizen-soldiers performed a number of tasks that contributed to the public peace and an orderly society. In the late eighteenth century, militiamen’s responsibilities included a variety of activities that would later become the province of police departments, including guarding prisoners and tracking down felons. After the turn of the century, as civilian authority grew, the militia’s duties evolved and became twofold. First, citizen-soldiers worked to protect neighbor from neighbor. When a gang of ruffians menaced a community or a political rivalry turned violent, the militia answered the alarm. Second, when an insurrection—a more serious threat than a brawl among neighbors—appeared imminent, only the militia wielded sufficient force to confront the insurgents. Adapting to the evolving social environment, citizen-soldiers provided stability and security to a maturing American society. The militia also contributed to the country’s economic stability and growth by facilitating the transition from a frontier barter economy to a system of market exchange. They did this in three ways. First, in the 1780s and 1790s, they protected isolated roads, salt licks, and iron furnaces from Indian attack. Second, united through their militia companies, citizen-soldiers sought to influence the political process in relation to economic policy. Speaking with a united voice, companies of militiamen called for boycotts and price controls, issued resolutions, and sought relief during hard times. Finally, the militia influenced the developing economy through direct participation. By carrying out their [ 48 ]

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normal duties and responsibilities of staging holiday celebrations, holding musters, and maintaining the public peace, citizen-soldiers created a demand for goods and services such as food, equipment, and training. Militiamen, in other words, provided fuel and maintenance for Kentucky’s developing economic engine. In the early 1790s, when Kentucky was more forest than farm, the state’s militia assisted local authorities with the various duties of policing a frontier society. In 1790 the militia aided efforts to obtain an accurate count of Kentucky’s population for the first national census. That same year, a Lexington court official suggested that militia captains tally “the depredations of the Indians committed in the several counties within the district” and convey those numbers to government authorities. Other responsibilities included assisting the local sheriff’s office with guarding prisoners and witnesses. In 1794 Lexington’s “Public Gaol was in so broken a condition that a prisoner could not be securely confined”—shades of Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha county jail. Governor Shelby therefore ordered a force of eighteen men from the Ninth Regiment to muster “for the safekeeping of the prisoner” a man accused of “a capital offense of great weight.” A year earlier, twenty-one Lexington militiamen made up a force “intended as a guard to the witnesses who are to give testimony on behalf of the Commonwealth against sundry persons . . . accused of capital crimes.” Criminal suspects and those willing to testify against them were not the only ones to receive the protection of the militia. Brigadier general and future Spanish conspirator James Wilkinson, who was Anthony Wayne’s second in command during the Indian campaigns of the early 1790s, finagled a guard to escort his family while they journeyed through dangerous Indian territory. Governor Christopher Greenup called up thirty militiamen in 1808 for service more directly related to state concerns, ordering the contingent into the Indiana Territory to search for three murder suspects. Whether the manhunt was successful is not known, but in Greenup’s view, only the militia possessed the necessary manpower and authority to track down the accused murderers. Once those accused of capital crimes were caught and convicted, the militia also assisted in carrying out the court’s death sentences. In June 1794 Lexington’s Court of Oyer and Terminer sentenced William Cox to death for passing counterfeit currency. On the day of his scheduled execution, the town’s militia companies escorted Cox to the gallows and [ 49 ]

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formed a square “with the prisoner in a cart in the center, with a rope about his neck, the end of which was held by the Sheriff.” Cox survived the day, however, after receiving a pardon from the governor. Nearly fifty years later, Capt. Samuel Worthington’s company of volunteers performed the same service for the sheriff of Mason County. The company’s captain was worried either about maintaining order or about his company’s appearance and therefore requested the state’s quartermaster general to “forward those pistols on to us as soon as you can . . . as we will be called out as a guard . . . in attending to the execution.” Worthington rightfully expected the necessary arms for his troops, who had responsibilities that policemen took on in later years. As the early years of the nineteenth century passed and society matured, a second responsibility regarding civic order developed for the militia. Citizen-soldiers increasingly found themselves protecting neighbor from neighbor. Even before the turn of the century, a few militiamen turned out to help a local acquaintance. In 1789 a band of wayward army regulars ransacked the home of a Limestone man and imprisoned him in a military garrison. Mason County militia lieutenant Henry Lee, “strongly impressed with a sense of the insult offered to the laws, the injury done the individual, and the pernicious consequence of such an example, raised a party of his militia and with a spirit highly to be applauded” gave chase to the regulars and confronted the officer in charge. Lee secured the release of his undoubtedly shaken Limestone neighbor. A few years later an overly eager militiaman, Andrew McCalla, rousted out his comrades when a band of street entertainers set up shop in Lexington. Some in the company thought it a bit ridiculous to muster against a troupe of actors, no matter what sort of nuisance they created. Fears of an embarrassing spectacle were realized when the unit paraded the captured “show man on horseback, dressed in party coloured clothes, blowing a trumpet in defiance as he rode thro’ the town, guarded by men with clubs.” In 1842 Capt. William Bradford worried that his company lacked sufficient weapons to ensure Lexington’s peace and stability. His concern proved well founded four years later when Lexington mayor Thomas Ross ordered out the Lexington Rifles, a corps of volunteer militia, “having been informed . . . that an attack is anticipated this night upon some person or persons and property in this city.” Other citizens expressed similar expectations of an outbreak of civil violence, but apparently none materialized. [ 50 ]

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In 1835 another group of Lexington citizens feared for their community’s well-being, but not because of a mysterious night attack. Instead, the danger was a moral one and came from those who enjoyed a game of chance. Those attending a “Meeting for the Suppression of Gambling” resolved that “the several Militia and volunteer companies . . . be requested to give their aid . . . in arresting and bringing to justice all persons guilty . . . of gaming contrary to law.” A writer to the Lexington Kentucky Gazette (who took the pen name of “No Gambler”) pointed out the futility and hypocrisy of the anti-gamblers’ campaign: “I consider your horse racing at Lexington to be as much gambling as cards or any other game. Will this society [break] up the race field? Call out the Militia and drive the company from the field:—Instead of this, I venture, without much hazard, that many of the members of this society will be found upon the race field openly betting upon the races.” One might have found a militiaman or two wagering as well. The society’s suggestion apparently never came to fruition, as the Kentucky Gazette reported no militia campaigns against either poker players or race horses. Although citizen-soldiers did not take the field, this episode underscores that the militia were a resource used to restore and maintain legal and moral order. Although gamblers and rumors of midnight assaults rarely forced Kentucky’s militia officers to order out their commands, domestic intrigues and partisan politics were a different story. Aaron Burr’s rumored plot to either capture Mexico from Spain or create an independent nation out of the southwestern United States originated in the Old Northwest, where he organized a force of volunteers and embarked on the Ohio River in December 1806. Secretary of War Henry Dearborn heard of the impending campaign and ordered Kentucky governor Christopher Greenup to call out a sufficient number of militia to prevent the expedition from heading farther south. On Christmas Day a Kentucky newspaper reported that a detachment of militia had “been posted at Louisville . . . with orders to examine all boats passing that place. . . . A number of boats, supposed to belong to Col. Burr, have passed Louisville within the last 5 or 6 days, loaded with arms, ammunition and provisions.” Less than two months later, soldiers captured the former vice president in the Mississippi Territory and escorted him to Richmond, Virginia, where he was tried for treason and acquitted. As the nation came to grips with the Burr scandal, tensions with an old adversary flared in June 1807 when the British warship hms Leopard [ 51 ]

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fired upon the American naval vessel Chesapeake. The Leopard’s captain believed British deserters had taken refuge aboard the American ship, and he was determined to bring them to justice. Dead and wounded American sailors littered the Chesapeake’s deck after the Leopard opened fire and a British press gang seized the suspected runaways. The nation responded with anti-British venom. Citizens condemned the attack as yet another British violation, and a bloody one at that, of American sovereignty. When word of the battle reached Kentucky, Captain Allison’s company of riflemen in Russellville went into action. The Russellville Mirror recorded the following: The captain and every man of his company (except some few aged and infirm) volunteered their services to fight the battles of their country; and on the same day almost every young man of this place volunteered, and are about to form themselves into a company, to tender their services to their country. It appears that every person feels too sensibly the late insult offered by the British to the American sons of liberty by their late dastardly and unprovoked attack on the American frigate Chesapeake, that more than the quota of men called for in the western part of the state will volunteer their services.

In the 1820s and 1830s, with a second victory over the British securing independence, the nation looked inward and rapidly became absorbed with a different kind of war—partisan politics. Andrew Jackson led the Democratic Party into the “Age of the Common Man,” battling against the likes of Henry Clay and the Whigs. Partisans on both sides, a few with perhaps too much party spirit, occasionally let their verbal jousting get out of hand. During the off-year elections in 1827, violence broke out in Cynthiana, where mobs damaged the courthouse, and in Mount Sterling, where raucous street fighting occurred. In the latter instance an anti-Jackson town official called out the militia to put the Democratic “Jackson men” in their place, but instead the Democrats, “indignant at this attempt to coerce them, commenced so violent an attack with stones, as soon compelled the military to retire.” The following year, the partisan polemics rose to a fevered pitch when Jackson opponents in Georgetown accused his followers of committing every conceivable crime and of creating anarchy. “The Jackson faction,” according to “One of the Sufferers,” perpetrated “the most horrid outrages on the lives and property of the Adams men. . . . A man and woman have been [ 52 ]

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hung up at every mile post.” Another anti-Jackson “sufferer” called for Captain Stephens’s company of militia to muster and “spread terror in the ranks of the enemy.” His demand came with one caveat: “That portion of the company favorable to the Jackson cause, will not, of course, be permitted to take to the field.” No sense adding fuel to the fire. The stories told by these two persecuted proto-Whigs appear to have been just that—stories. No other evidence verifies the existence of a rampaging mob of Jackson partisans spreading terror and destruction in Scott County. In a similar instance during the Nullification Crisis in 1833, a Nicholasville resident advocated preparing a company of militiamen “to march at a moment’s warning against the Nullifiers, who have collected in considerable numbers at the Big Bone Lick.” Although none of these political squabbles actually deteriorated into full-fledged riots, the attitude of those involved is telling. Believing that public order was in jeopardy, or in some cases attempting to create that impression, participants demanded that authorities call out the militia. No one asked for the local sheriff or requested the United States Army. Citizen-soldiers were the accepted and viable option. The public saw the militia as available and wielding, at least in theory, sufficient force and authority to maintain civil order and public peace. At times, civil authorities could not call on the militia for assistance because it was the militiamen themselves who were creating the disturbance. In 1798, for example, a defendant in a domestic dispute that had made its way into the Frankfort courts demonstrated the risks of making impertinent remarks about the governor. As a consequence, “several young men, . . . attended by the military music of the infantry company[,] beset the house he was in, dragged him out, undertook to call him to an account, and (the drum beating the rogues march) conducted him to the top of the hill, where they dismissed him with some threatening cautions. This,” the Lexington Kentucky Gazette disclosed, “is not the first breach of the peace of a similar kind, which has disgraced our metropolis.” Nor was it likely the last. Nevertheless, in most instances when a simple disagreement between neighbors escalated into a violent confrontation, Americans looked to the militia to reestablish peace and community order. A final, and perhaps the most difficult, task taken on by citizensoldiers was responding to a rebellion or insurrection. Such threats demanded the full attention and martial authority of the militia. No [ 53 ]

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other institution, with the possible exception of the United States Army, had the necessary resources. The regular army’s limited strength and deployment, combined with constitutional restrictions and the traditional republican apprehension of professional soldiers, made them an impractical force for stabilizing domestic unrest. Conversely, the militia existed in nearly every town and county, without the political stigma that burdened the professionals. When it came to rebellions, foremost in the minds of white southerners were the dangers posed by the slave population. From the Stono Rebellion in 1739 to the terror of Nat Turner’s war of retribution in 1831, whispers of rebellion haunted the white South. Fleeting rumors threatened to become reality, and slave owners remained ever vigilant. In 1810 Col. George Trotter ordered Lt. W. W. Worsley to muster a guard to patrol the evening streets of Lexington, directing that his men were “not to disturb the white citizens, but to apprehend and secure all very suspicious blacks who may be found in the streets in doubtful situations.” Either the colonel’s precautions dissuaded a contemplated uprising or Lexington’s slaves had planned no rebellion; no disturbance was recorded. Governor Isaac Shelby took steps in 1816 to ensure that volunteer militia units were sufficiently armed “in case of an insurrection amongst the slaves—a thing always to be guarded against in a country like ours.” Slaves were not the only potential source of rebellion. In the late summer of 1845, mountainous Clay County in southeastern Kentucky was on the verge of civil war. One Abner Baker, having been convicted of murdering Daniel Bates, awaited execution in the Manchester jail. The first sign of trouble appeared on Governor William Owsley’s desk in midAugust when a letter arrived from Manchester jailer John Cole. Cole had recently exchanged words with Abner’s brother, William, over jailhouse visitations. Fearing William would complain to the governor, Cole wrote to explain his side of the story. Two weeks later, Cole and William Baker had not reconciled their differences; in fact, the dispute escalated. The jailer received evidence of “an armed force concentrating not far from Manchester to rescue Abner Baker.” Moreover, Baker’s rescue party had commandeered “public arms” intended for the militia. As a result, Owsley ordered Adj. Gen. Peter Dudley to Manchester to assess the situation and, if necessary, call out sufficient militia to “quell any insurrection against the laws of our Commonwealth and interference with the execution of its judgements.” The following day, Dudley [ 54 ]

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ordered out four companies, approximately two hundred men, from Richmond in Madison County. In a letter to Owsley, Dudley cited three reasons for mustering Madison instead of Clay County troops: the Clay units were badly disorganized; the mountainous terrain made musters difficult; and perhaps most significant, “disaffection exists among the very officers and men composing those companies.” Dudley hoped to avoid “arranging neighbor against neighbor.” Later that day, Dudley reconsidered whether two hundred militiamen were adequate. He had received word that the insurgents had raised the stakes with the appropriation of a small cannon. Quickly scratching off a letter, he asked the governor to order out the volunteers of the Lexington Legion and their small field piece to counter the rebels’ artillery. What had begun as a dispute over jail visitation had brewed up into a potential civil war, with militia units from nearly seventy-five miles away on the march to confront fellow Kentuckians. Governor Owsley judiciously declined to call out the Lexington companies and instead directed Dudley to reevaluate the situation, reminding him of his wish to avoid a deadly confrontation. The governor’s intuition proved correct, and upon reassessment Dudley reported that the situation required only one hundred Madison County militiamen to provide relief for the Manchester jailer and his guards. Dudley had found the Clay County militia as he expected—“totally disorganized,” with “brother arrayed against brother.” A few weeks later authorities carried out the execution of Abner Baker without incident. The Frankfort Commonwealth closed the incident with the observation that “the laws were properly respected and obeyed.” The Clay County rebellion demonstrates that in this instance the state’s militia effectively responded to a crisis that could easily have deteriorated into a bloody confrontation. Proper and prudent leadership from Owsley and Dudley accounts in part for the peaceful resolution of the disturbance. The immediate decision to deploy the militia and the determination to keep the number of militiamen to a minimum peacefully reestablished the authority of the government, clearly the most desirable outcome. Credit must also go the citizen-soldiers of Madison County, who responded with order and discipline, arriving in Manchester eight days after receiving the call from Dudley. After the incident was over, Owsley complimented the Richmond troops, who “so discreetly executed this delicate trust as perfectly to quiet the high excitement that existed [ 55 ]

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and safely to preserve the public peace from the blot of civil broils and bloodshed.” The Clay County rebellion illustrates how the militia system, when properly used, could effectively maintain civil order. Whether a few militiamen guarding a prisoner accused of a capital crime or entire companies turning out to maintain order among combative neighbors, the militia assisted civil authorities in establishing order and maintaining the peace. Prior to statehood, their presence symbolized stability; after statehood, their participation in law enforcement brought order to towns far removed from the long-settled communities of the East, an order that encouraged the immigration of new residents. In later years their response to civil unrest ensured a continuation of that stability. As Kentucky grew from a collection of scattered frontier crossroads into a thriving nineteenth-century society, the militia, despite rumors of its demise, remained the institution that Kentuckians turned to for peace of mind. Order and stability encouraged not only an expanding population but also the evolution of the state’s economy from frontier subsistence to market capitalism. From the 1790s to the 1840s, the militia became a driving force in the transition from a locally oriented, barter economy to a regional, national, and at times international market economy. Their activities included defending nascent manufacturing sites, exerting pressure on economic policy makers, and participating in the economy by buying and selling goods and services. In Kentucky’s early years, when frontiersmen were more common than farmers, the militia supported economic development by posting guards along the Wilderness Road and at the salt and iron works scattered throughout the region. The Wilderness Road, initially cut by Daniel Boone and thirty-odd pioneers in 1775, was more wilderness than road. The trail promised the fertile soil of the Bluegrass country if one survived the journey through the Cumberland Gap, where Indian attacks were common until the late 1790s. Large parties and militiamen provided the only meaningful shield for travelers. Salt production began almost as soon as the first whites arrived in Kentucky. Given the mountainous terrain and hostile Indians, transporting this necessity from the East was prohibitively expensive, making the production sites vital to the region’s development. Settlers used the product primarily as a meat preservative, and by 1785 the various salt works produced enough to satisfy local demand. The remote locations of the salt licks, however, [ 56 ]

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made them easy targets for Indian raids, and working them was a dangerous business. To decrease the risk to workers and ensure that the product made it to market, militiamen provided a rotating guard. Each contingent included ten to twenty men who lived at the site for anywhere from two weeks to two months. Even with the guards in place, Indians still occasionally attacked the licks. Kentucky’s iron industry developed in a similar fashion. Despite the fact that the iron works required a larger, more skilled workforce, the early iron furnaces were also isolated enclaves that dotted the frontier. Bourbon Furnace, the region’s first iron works, began operation along Slate Creek in present Bath County in March 1791. As with the salt licks, the militia provided protection for the ironmasters and their crews, and guard duty frequently proved dangerous, if not deadly. George Trumbo was part of a contingent of militiamen guarding a Bourbon County furnace when it came under attack. “The indians just caught ens. Barnett in a tree top . . . [and killed] him,” Trumbo recounted. “Johnson they shot in the groin as he was running. The shot passed thro’ the bladder, & killed him.” It was hazardous duty, but the survival of two of Kentucky’s earliest industries depended on the militiamen’s protection. As the dangers associated with working a salt lick or iron furnace dissipated in the early nineteenth century, Kentucky’s citizen-soldiers took on another role in the state’s expanding economy. Recognizing that financial security depended on more than hard work, good weather, and good luck, militiamen, who were primarily farmers, began to participate in the political economy. Through the collective voice of their companies, they sought to influence political debates and policies that affected their economic well-being. One of the earliest and most important issues they confronted was navigation of the Mississippi River. For Kentucky and much of the trans-Appalachian west, economic survival depended on a guaranteed market for agricultural goods, and that meant ensuring access to the Mississippi River. Navigation rights to the Mississippi had been the focus of debates, foreign intrigue, and near-war since the arrival of the region’s first white settlers. The issue’s intensity awoke the slumbering Bourbon County Committee, an organization of militiamen headed by the rather anonymous farmer William Henry. Under his leadership, they had initially made their voice heard during the drafting and ratification of Kentucky’s first state constitution in 1792. Meeting again in June 1794, this collection of radical, egalitarian, politically oriented [ 57 ]

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citizen-soldiers orchestrated the election of two men from each militia company to serve as representatives at a general meeting later that month at the county courthouse. There the militiamen adopted a number of resolutions calling for unity of effort and declaring their “just right, the free navigation of the river mississippi.” The adoption the following year of Pinckney’s Treaty, in which Spain guaranteed America’s right to the free navigation of the entire river, seemingly settled the dispute, promising a potential economic boom in the trans-Appalachian region; but in Kentucky the issue refused to die. In November 1803, just six months after Jefferson’s purchase of the Louisiana Territory from France, elements of the Spanish army who contested the terms of the sale continued to occupy land along the Mississippi. A writer in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette admonished the militia to defend the “honor and interest of the United States” and prepare to “step forward and assert her rights.” As a demonstration of support and readiness, Captain Wyatt’s and Captain Postlethwait’s Light Infantry companies mustered and paraded through Lexington. The militiamen’s preparations proved unnecessary, however, when Spain abandoned the disputed territory, defusing the impending crisis and ensuring permanent American access to the Mississippi River and the markets beyond. Beyond working to secure transportation routes for the region’s producers, militiamen aggressively pursued a variety of strategies to improve their economic well-being. In February 1800 Bourbon County residents gathered at the courthouse to mull over “the alarming situation of our country, occasioned by the great scarcity of money.” The dearth of cash produced a surplus of conversation as the crowd debated idea after idea, each intended to secure the farmers’ financial survival. They passed a series of resolutions that called for boycotts against merchants who imported products, for promoting home manufactured goods and paper, and for monthly meetings of concerned citizens. Wanting to give teeth to these measures, they resolved “that it be recommended to the field officers of the militia and captains of companies to use their endeavors in promoting and carrying into effect these resolutions.” It is possible that Bourbon County residents drew inspiration from the Revolution’s Continental Association, an organization of patriots that used its coercive powers to enforce the boycotts of British goods in the 1770s. Although the effectiveness of this latter-day association remains [ 58 ]

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unknown, this episode demonstrates the economic role Kentuckians ascribed to their militia, seeing them as more than simply part-time soldiers. Local companies were an instrument for encouraging adherence to and compliance with community-defined economic policies. At times the militiamen adopted a more aggressive strategy to improve their economic well-being and financial future. The men of Capt. Edward Darnaby’s company converged on their muster grounds in January 1811 to map out a strategy for selling their hemp. The militiamen made public their efforts, hoping to convince “every farmer and friend to his country . . . to convene together in their respective neighborhoods and make such arrangements as would enable them to export their hemp, unless a fair price can be had in this country.” Such organized economic activism was not unique to the militia. Historian Stephen Aron notes that that same year both cordwainers and shoemakers united to protest poor wages. The difference, however, was that the men who sought to counter low hemp prices united through their identity as militiamen, not as an organization of hemp farmers. These citizen-soldiers used their militia companies’ preexisting organization to confront an economic crisis. During the Panic of 1819, economic anxieties continued to attract the attention of militia officers. The boom of earlier years had turned to bust with the end of the Napoleonic Wars. With the return of peace, European demand for American farm goods rapidly declined. The nation’s agricultural regions, including the West, suffered great hardship, and Kentucky was no exception. For leadership during the crisis, communities looked to their militia officers. Shelbyville residents gathered in May to discuss the “embarrassed state of the finances of our country, and to deliberate upon the means best calculated to avert the impending ruin which seems to threaten many of our honest and industrious citizens.” Entrusting their concerns and livelihood to Maj. Samuel W. White, they appointed him chairman of the meeting, with Col. James Bristow as secretary. In Louisville, as the people confronted the possibility of financial ruin, they too turned to the militia and chose as their chairman Col. Richard Taylor. Over the next twenty years, Kentuckians continued to look to militia officers for leadership during times of economic hardship. In 1820 Gen. Richard M. Johnson and Maj. Matthew Flourny led a meeting that dealt with property legislation. In 1821 a General Birdsong and Capt. Retin Davidge chaired a gathering of Hopkinsville residents seeking [ 59 ]

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relief from the lingering effects of the 1819 economic downturn. And at an 1838 meeting of the Bourbon County Agricultural Society, members elected three militia officers to serve as president and co–vice presidents. In these instances of economic crisis, Kentuckians placed their trust in men who already occupied positions of leadership, men who had demonstrated their character and capabilities through service in local militia companies. The same men who chaired these meetings controlled holiday celebrations and their associated toast-making ritual. The toasts presented at these affairs give insight into the thoughts of community leaders and what audiences heard from the most influential and powerful men. Far from being innocuous platitudes to false heroes and causes, the toasts promoted the speakers’ ideologies and partisan points of view and included issues relating to the region’s or the nation’s economic health. In 1788 a Fourth of July celebration in Lexington produced one of the earliest recorded series of toasts offered at a militia gathering, which included a matter of grave concern to Kentuckians—free navigation of the Mississippi River. Foretelling the activism of William Henry and the Bourbon County Committee, the toasts leave little doubt of the importance Kentuckians placed on access to the mighty Mississippi: “The Navigation of the Mississippi, at any price but that of Liberty.” Fortunately for the state’s future as a part of the American union, the treaty John Jay negotiated with England in 1795 became law after Kentucky had become the fifteenth state. The treaty, which left in dispute American access to the Mississippi, so infuriated Kentuckians that the reversal of Jay’s Treaty by Pinckney’s Treaty in 1796 only moderated their concerns. As late as 1806, Independence Day crowds heard pledges like this one: “The River Mississippi—may its navigation be as permanent and uninterrupted, as the stream itself.” In addition to voicing their apprehensions over access to the Mississippi, Kentuckians singled out other areas of the economy for public consumption at holiday events. During the final years of the eighteenth century, salutes to the commercial interests of the state remained simple; speakers were content to wish them success but little else: “Agriculture and her handmaid commerce” or “Success to agriculture, manufactures and commerce.” Beginning in 1803 these toasts became increasingly articulate and expressive, promoting the ideological tenets of a Jeffersonian political economy. Speakers at a celebration on the Elkhorn River [ 60 ]

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in central Kentucky lifted their glasses to “Agriculture—may it flourish and may farmers feel their independence,” which was immediately followed by “Commerce—may it extend to all nations who wish to trade on terms of reciprocity.” That same year, just a few miles away in Frankfort, listeners heard the praise of “Agriculture, manufactures and commerce, the genuine sources of independence and prosperity.” Toast makers continued these themes of approbation and support for the next few years as Kentucky’s economy expanded and matured. As tensions with Europe escalated during the first decade of the nineteenth century over violations of American shipping rights and impressment of U.S. sailors, the tenor of economic toasts became increasingly antagonistic and defensive. “Agriculture, the salvation of Columbia, a basis of manly Independence, which scorns every art of assault” drew five enthusiastic cheers in 1806. In the midst of Jefferson’s doomed embargo, one Kentuckian defended the unpopular measure and endeavored to reassure his listeners of America’s productive might: “The embargo— thanks to the wisdom of Jefferson, this measure has unfolded to us the riches of our country, and demonstrated to an astonished world, that by our industry we shall not stand in need of European commodities.” In Winchester one patron of the economy expressed his faith in federal monetary policies and their ability to promote economic development. Instructing the audience on his view of the nation’s political economy, he proposed this toast: “Agriculture: may a liberal price for our staple commodity by the aid of the general government, produce a sufficiency for our consumption, without the aid of Russia.” He continued, “Manufactures of Kentucky: the main spring of national wealth and independence; stimulated by the general government to risk their fortunes in such establishments, may they not be abandoned.” The outbreak of war did little to change Kentuckians’ belief in the importance of and commitment to economic expansion. In 1812, holiday speakers at militia events conveyed to their audiences the significance of the economy and the necessity of war: “Commerce and manufactures—We approve war to protect the former—peaceable regulations to protect the latter.” With the cessation of hostilities in 1815, the worries of Kentuckians over economic issues declined both in frequency and in fervor. References to agriculture, manufacturing, and trade returned to simpler expressions of support: “A pure and rigid National Economy— Nothing else will give satisfaction.” [ 61 ]

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When the United States emerged victorious from its second war with Great Britain, the country had firmly and finally established its political and economic independence. Prior to and during the war years, toast makers consistently reminded their listeners of the close relationship between economic prosperity and the nation’s security. Once victory ensured sovereignty and independence, the number and ardor of toasts concerning the politics of agriculture, manufacturing, and commerce declined. These expressions of economic awareness and ideology, like the enforcement of boycotts or meetings to fix hemp prices, demonstrate how citizen-soldiers participated in defining the political economy. A final and the most immediate effect that citizen-soldiers had on local economies was their direct participation in the marketplace. For the merchants and traders who equipped the militia with food, clothing, tents, weapons, and other paraphernalia of the military arts, any mustering of citizen-soldiers meant sales. Purveyors and vendors also found customers among the crowds that gathered to watch kinfolk and neighbors march about on the town square. Fourth of July celebrations were likely as lucrative as quarterly musters, if not more so. The thousands who attended events like the 1842 “Camp Scott” rally provided an economic windfall to local merchants, traders, and anyone with something to sell. In addition to the obvious exchange of goods, people carried on more subtle forms of business at these gatherings. In 1808 Capt. Robert McAfee mustered his company on a June Saturday for a day of marching and drilling. “There were a number of people and much friendship,” he recorded in his journal, and later in the day he “took up a note from J. Baker and several other little debts.” Monetary concerns thus mixed with the captain’s interest in military training, as he demonstrated again less than three weeks later when he “rode on down to . . . Captain George McAfee’s muster.” As before, McAfee had more on his mind than militia drills: “There were a great number of men present. I [met] William A. and conversed with him on business.” Even the state recognized the usefulness of a militia muster and through 1811 designated muster days as an opportunity for property holders to present a list of their taxable property. Like court days, holidays, and Sundays, militia days attracted a variety of people who, not surprisingly, carried on all manner of business.

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On a larger scale, extended expeditions and battalion musters required commanding officers to solicit bids from and offer contracts to suppliers. Governor and militia commander-in-chief Isaac Shelby advertised for the lowest bidder in 1795 to supply “rations to the three garrisons posted on the Wilderness Road for the next tour of 6 months.” In a similar fashion, the Kentucky Company of Dragoons solicited proposals “for furnishing the Troops . . . with supplies of Subsistence” at their 1833 “recruiting rendezvous.” Some up-and-coming entrepreneurs were wheeling and dealing to the point of exploitation, forcing one officer to issue orders to prevent unscrupulous vendors from swindling his men. Nevertheless, not all merchants became rich. In 1794 one Mr. Eliot undoubtedly thought himself fortunate when he received the contract to supply a brigade of Charles Scott’s army of Indian fighters. Having loaded his packhorses, Eliot set out for Fort Hamilton on the Miami River, in the heart of Indian country. Before reaching the safety of the fort, Indians attacked and killed the army contractor. No one had guaranteed profit without peril. The government of Kentucky, fulfilling its responsibility for procuring weapons for the state’s militia companies, also fueled the region’s economy. John B. Tilford, a “Wholesale Grocer, Commissioner, and Forwarding Merchant,” profited from state expenditures in 1842 by supplying “4 Brace cartg. swords & pistols” to Adj. Gen. Peter Dudley. Once purchased, weapons had to be maintained, and by the 1840s the state financed their upkeep. In 1847, Maysville resident A. R. Crosby found himself competing with firms in Cincinnati and Pittsburgh for the contract to repair state-owned muskets. Volunteer units, which became increasingly popular following the War of 1812, had always created a demand for personal items, including horses, uniforms, weapons, and leather goods. In 1798 a company of “gentlemen composing the hamilton troop of light dr agoons,” who resided just north of the Ohio River, advertised in the Lexington Stewart’s Kentucky Herald their desire to buy a number of horses—Ohio cash for Kentucky horseflesh. In 1807 the Lexington Troop of Cavalry recorded monies spent on musical instruments, sheet music, paint, books, clothing for their trumpeter, and the ubiquitous whiskey. Musically minded militiamen could obtain their instruments from entrepreneurs like Reuben Stivers, a shop owner in Lexington who, during

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the 1790s, supplied drums and fifes to company commanders “on the shortest notice.” The business establishment of Tilford, Scott & Trotter offered “Swords, Epaulets, & Plumes” to Lexington’s citizen-soldiers in 1812. Competition stiffened in the military market the following year when R. Megowan & Company received “a large and elegant assortment . . . of military trimmings,” everything an aspiring colonel or general could want: “Swords, Epaulets, Sashes, Silver Lace, Sword Knots, Gold & Silver, Silver Plates, for Caps and Belts, Military Buttons, Plumes of various colours, Dirks, Undress Swords, [and] Silver Cord.” An 1807 description of Col. John Bullock’s regiment sounded as much like an endorsement of American industry as of military prowess: “Clothed with American manufactures, armed with American arms,” the regiment appeared a “formidable phalanx of citizen-soldiers.” Other entrepreneurs appealed to the martial customer from a variety of angles. A Lexington saddler advertised his skills in the “several branches of saddling & military accoutrement making”; and for the well-read militiaman, publishers Hunter and Beaumont advertised Steuben’s Manual Exercise, which contained “a full description of every motion in the Manual Exercise, so plainly delineated as to be clearly understood by every person; and as [a] useful assistant on general muster days, ought to be in the possession of every citizen Soldier.” Another shopkeeper carried a collection of Duane’s Military Books, including the Handbook for Infantry, the Handbook for Riflemen, and the Military Dictionary, “all at the Philadelphia prices.” If one desired to continue his education beyond the lessons of Duane’s Military Books, itinerant instructors occasionally hung out their shingle (or sword, as the case may be) and offered training in a variety of military skills. In 1809 Joseph Ellerback’s curriculum concentrated on “manoeuvering” and the “use of arms.” Four years later John Cipriani offered specialized instruction in “the Exercise and use of the broadsword.” Hoping to capitalize on the more talented members of the militia, one gentleman even opened a “military music school” in 1816. But the most durable of all military educators was Maj. R. I. Dunn, who first appeared in Lexington in 1814 and traveled the region for twenty-five years, educating Kentucky’s young men in marching, swordsmanship, and other martial necessities. Dunn also drilled a generation of military students through the sale of his Military Pocket Manual.

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While the military education market made up only a thin slice of Kentucky’s economic pie, the militia’s overall economic impact was more far-reaching. From the early days of settlement to the 1850s, militiamen encouraged the state’s transition from barter to market, from economic infancy to fiscal adolescence. Like other public institutions whose influence on economic growth waned with the maturation of private enterprise, so too did the militia’s role in financial affairs. Nevertheless, during Kentucky’s earliest decades, safeguarding and promoting the region’s economic interests was yet another responsibility of the citizen-soldier. An early nineteenth-century observer of the Bluegrass State commented, “Nowhere in America has the almost instantaneous change, from an uncultivated waste to the elegances of civilization, been so striking” as in Kentucky. As rapidly as any state, Kentucky advanced from the forests and trails of a frontier to the homes and shops of a community. The militia’s contribution to that transformation was substantial and diverse. Celebrations, funerals, and miscellaneous gatherings strengthened the tenuous bonds of community while reinforcing the hierarchical ladder of race, gender, and class. In addition, citizensoldiers maintained civil order and stability in their hometowns and states, and bolstered the transition to a market economy. Like the ingredients in a Kentucky burgoo, community identity, social hierarchy, civil order, and economic growth blended with one another to create a complex society. Don Harrison Doyle, in his study of Jacksonville, Illinois, writes that “the problem of building new communities was social as well as economic. It involved the constant influx of uprooted newcomers, the clash of unfamiliar cultures, and the early difficulty of defining status and leadership in an unformed social structure.” Doyle further observes that “for community leaders and property-owners, the problems of social disorder were ultimately intertwined with the overriding concerns of promoting the town’s economic future.” Within and around the militia and their events, the elements of community growth and development coalesced. Citizen-soldiers were the coordinators, the men whose activities defined, organized, maintained, and led Kentucky communities on the path to settlement and civilization.

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In the summer of 1810, Charles Curryman, a self-described “old man,” took time from the demands of the small farm he rented to write a letter to the Lexington Kentucky Gazette in nearby Lexington. Curryman’s sons had recently returned from the local militia muster, telling stories not of marching and drilling but of speeches promising “great things” by candidates for the state assembly. The old farmer was even more surprised when his youngest boy said that “Mr. such and one, and he is a lawyer and a candidate, told my brother that he and you could vote, and so could every man above 21 years of age.” Not sure whether to believe his son’s story, Curryman attended the next muster to see for himself. Describing the day, Curryman wrote that soon after he arrived at the muster grounds, “Mr. Z. the friend of my candidate asked me to drink some grog, and took me to a Booth, and there I was saluted with a hearty shake of the hand from all the candidates, who seemed to be as much my friends as if they had known me all our lives.” A few minutes later the Curryman boys’ tale was confirmed: “The candidates began to speak, and they promised a great deal of good things to us people if we would elect them.” Following the speeches, Curryman joined a small crowd of his neighbors to mull over the candidates’ merits. Was so-and-so a true republican? questioned one man. If he was, came a reply, we’d see him on more than just Election Day. Besides, added another, they all claim to be republicans and patriots when it’s vote-counting time. Curryman didn’t quite know what to make of this exchange and the events he had witnessed, but what he saw and heard captured his imagination and taught him about his “sacred and important” duty and right as a citizen to participate in the electoral process. Curryman’s exposure to the world of politics at a county militia muster was not an unusual event [ 66 ]

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in the early nineteenth century. Militia grounds became the schoolhouse where Americans learned to exercise their political rights and responsibilities. For more than six decades, citizen-soldiers contributed to Kentucky’s political development by accelerating the process of democratization and encouraging participation in partisan activities. The Revolution’s ideals of equality and independence had sown the seeds of democracy, but Americans needed to adapt to this new political environment just as their predecessors had adapted to the harsh opportunities of the American wilderness. Historian Ronald P. Formisano describes the early republic as a time of transition, during which colonial deferential politics gave way to the partisan free-for-all of the second party system. This transitional “deferential-participant” phase did not occur in a linear fashion; rather, it leapt ahead in fits and starts, finding the most fertile ground on the frontier, away from the time- and tradition-encrusted politics of the East. In places like Kentucky, on the boundary between settled familiarity and tentative anticipation, democracy flourished by mixing the East’s political ideals with the West’s social fluidity. Unaccustomed to the deferential politics of earlier generations, men on the frontier saw little reason to surrender their political voice to any man. But even on civilization’s edge, wealth still equaled power. How then, convinced of his right to equal participation and influence in the political process, did the country’s Charles Currymans challenge the emerging elite? Why did democracy take root and later grow into a thriving two-party system in Kentucky? At least part of the explanation lies with the region’s citizen-soldiers. Kentucky’s militiamen challenged and participated in the traditional political order in three significant ways. First, in the era of the enrolled militia, citizen-soldiers acted as proponents of and a vehicle for democratization. In the 1780s and 1790s, as Kentuckians moved to separate from Virginia and petition Congress for statehood, men whose political influence reached no further than their Election Day votes began to make themselves heard. They discovered that their enrolled militia companies provided a ready-made conduit into the political world because of their preexisting organization and pervasive presence throughout the state. Companies provided a way for the middle and lower classes to participate in politics and, with a unified voice, challenge the rule of the rich, the wise, and the well connected. Put another way, the enrolled [ 67 ]

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militia operated as proto-political organizations for men whose social rank had limited their access to the politics of lawyers and planters. Militia companies became the voice of the politically anonymous during the long series of constitutional conventions when citizen-soldiers challenged the region’s leadership for a more egalitarian form of government, including higher taxes on the wealthy and, even more radical, universal manhood suffrage. Through the enrolled militia, ordinary citizens took their rightful place in the extraordinary process of American democracy. Second, by the early nineteenth century, politics in America was well on its way to fully abandoning the founders’ aversion to partisanship. Citizen-soldiers were no exception, embracing party politics and promoting partisan activities. The demise of the enrolled militia following the War of 1812 brought volunteer companies to life just as political parties took root and grew into the brier patch of the second party system. In the tangle of competing political ideals, agendas, and emotions, the volunteer militia became auxiliary organizations aligned either with the Whigs or with the Democrats. Taking epithets like the “Hickory Artillery,” these units held rallies and parades and campaigned for their favorite candidates. The spectacular show of parading militiamen in elaborate uniforms, thundering artillery fire, and plentiful food and drink attracted unsuspecting political agnostics to hear Whig and Democratic preachers. Many left converted to the new American religion of partisan politics. Finally, some militiamen recognized that their military experience could prove advantageous in the electoral process, and more than one parlayed a militia record into a political career. So great were the numbers of captains, majors, and colonels running for office in the 1820s that one critic cautioned against the “mad military enthusiasm” that threatened to overwhelm the country. Such warnings, while slightly exaggerated, suggest the militiaman’s influence on the maturation of Kentucky politics. Militia companies and individual citizen-soldiers became part of the political process even as they advanced democratization. From the first heartbeat of the body politic in the 1780s to the partisanship of the 1830s and 1840s, the enrolled and volunteer citizen-soldiers more often than not found themselves in a political battle rather than a military campaign.

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In November 1784, at the frontier outpost of Danville in Virginia’s transmontane District of Kentucky, an extralegal gathering of leading settlers met to discuss the region’s pressing problems. Militia officer Col. William Fleming presided over the first day’s debates. Chairing the second and final day’s deliberations was Col. Isaac Shelby, another militia officer and hero of the Revolution’s Battle of King’s Mountain. The delegates set December 27 as the date when representatives, chosen from each of the district’s several militia companies, would return to Danville and take up concerns over trade, Indians, and the question of separation from their home state of Virginia. As the November assembly broke up—the first of ten meetings that eventually produced a state constitution—individuals journeyed home, considering the next meeting’s agenda. The first paragraph of Kentucky’s political history had been written, and its principal authors were militiamen. Following these first steps toward statehood in 1784, Kentuckians returned to Danville for ten different conventions over the next eight years, finally achieving statehood in 1792. Few details remain of the early conventions because note taking was scanty and delegates often decided little but to call a subsequent convention. Nevertheless, extant records reveal another instance of the militia’s political dealings just prior to the fourth convention in September 1786. James Wilkinson, noted Indian fighter and future general, and Humphrey Marshall, Kentucky’s first historian, battled each other for election as delegate. On the first of three election days, a local sheriff kept polls closed until Marshall’s supporters, frustrated by the delay, returned to their homes. The Wilkinson faction, on the other hand, bided their time, waited out their opponents, and voted when the sheriff finally opened the polls. On the third and final day of the election, militia officers who were undoubtedly Wilkinson men ordered their companies to muster in the more remote regions of the county, forcing Marshall supporters to chose between a day at some far-off muster ground or remaining home to vote and suffering a fine for failing to muster. As with the shenanigans two day earlier, the pro-Marshall faction had been neatly maneuvered out of casting their votes. Wilkinson emerged the victor and became delegate to the fourth convention. Following the sixth convention in July 1788, Kentuckians gained better access to the issues under debate, if not the debates themselves, through the region’s first newspaper, the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, [ 69 ]

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which began publication in 1787. Over the next five years the Gazette became the forum for political deliberation and polemics as writers wrangled over divisive topics like independence from Virginia, navigation rights to the Mississippi, and constitutional theory. Such was the case in the fall of 1788 as Kentuckians prepared for their seventh convention, which was set to convene on November 3. Delegates focused on the question of Kentucky’s independence— whether the region’s inhabitants would enjoy greater economic prosperity and better protection from marauding Indians by establishing a separate state government, by creating a governmental structure completely independent of the United States, or by remaining under the aegis of distant Richmond. Concerns arose over the convention’s leadership and whether leaders made a legitimate effort to assess the attitudes and opinions of the people at large or instead assumed decision-making authority on their own. In a letter to the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, a writer who went by the name “A Fellow Citizen” reminded readers that at the sixth convention, which had met just two months earlier, one delegate proposed that militia officers poll the people in their respective districts and report the results at the next convention. This division of labor by way of the preexisting militia districts would permit the people to express their opinions directly to their local company captains, who could then convey their collective sentiments to the convention. Opponents of the motion acted quickly to discredit the proposal, offering a number of objections. Were company commanders adequately prepared to inform the people of both the advantages and the disadvantages of separation from Virginia? And even if they were, how many of their neighbors could or should they talk with about so vital a question? Moreover, did anyone really believe that these men were simply disinterested militia captains without personal agendas? Critics argued that the proposal would give officers the chance to advance their own desires rather than the public’s will, presumably at the cost of the common good. Conceding to these objections, convention delegates voted down the motion and expressed their “opinion that the only safe[,] just[,] and rational mode of decision was in full and open convention.” Although “A Fellow Citizen” concurred with the convention’s decision against the use of company officers, the plan itself demonstrates how the militia’s county-based structure could easily be adapted to political needs and, more significant still, that some residents turned to the [ 70 ]

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militia to resolve a political problem. Clearly, the militia was something more than just a military organization. A month later, voices more sympathetic to the militia’s involvement in politics appeared in the Kentucky Gazette. “A Farmer” summarized the debates and actions of the six previous conventions and argued that representatives drawn from militia districts would give voice to the ordinary man’s concerns. Devoting extensive passages to the legislature’s mistreatment of the militia, especially the lack of proper financial compensation, “A Farmer” railed against militia officers, usually well-to-do landholders, who ordered the poor to abandon their “growing crop to be destroyed for want of tillage and perform a month’s tour on the frontiers. . . . Thus the nose of the poor has been held to the grind-stone of oppression.” Company-based elections would put in farmers’ hands a shield to confront if not a sword to challenge the elite’s abuse of power. The election of militiamen would allow “the wisdom of the District in a general Council to take into consideration the . . . state of our detached and distressed Country.” In Fayette County, militiamen sympathetic to “A Farmer’s” argument ignored the spirit of the sixth convention’s prohibition of polling by militia captains and instructed convention delegates to support separation from Virginia. These early intrusions by the militia into the political realm, although erratic and tentative, prepared them for the climactic and final state convention where delegates drafted the state’s first constitution. Better organized and armed with an egalitarian, anti-aristocratic agenda, militiamen girded themselves for the tenth state convention. Recognizing that to challenge the established aristocracy required a united and coordinated strategy, militiamen formed political organizations similar to the county committees of the Revolutionary War era. Meeting at “Col. Todd’s old place” on September 12, 1791, citizen-soldiers formed the Fayette County Committee and recommended that other committees send at least two members to a general meeting in Harrodsburg, scheduled for mid-November. Their stated agenda was “to be of an uniformity in their instructions to the convention to form a bill of rights and Constitution for this district.” The most active and vocal of the various committees sprang up in Bourbon County, with the rather unknown William Henry at the helm. As chairman of the Bourbon County Committee and as a man without substantial or even moderate wealth, Henry became the primary spokesman for the militia [ 71 ]

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and an advocate of an egalitarian system of government. He penned a number of essays that appeared in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, each outlining specific resolutions and instructions pertaining to the upcoming constitutional convention. His primary objective was a militia-based representative system in which a convocation of two members from each company would select convention delegates, issue instructions to the convention, and assess the public’s response to the proposed constitution. One rather optimistic militiaman even suggested that county committees should wield veto power over future legislative acts, an idea that pushed radicalism beyond reason, even for many of his citizen-soldier brethren. The Bourbon County militiamen framed the majority of their proposals with the intent of decreasing the authority and influence of the region’s “designing men,” those distinguished by their wealth and power. The committee propounded a more equitable system of taxation that particularly took into account the huge tracts of land held by the elite minority. A unicameral legislature would inhibit either the establishment or the expansion of invidious class distinctions, lower the financial burden of government, and limit the corrupting effect of patronage. Ballot elections would discourage polling fraud, and in what was its most radical and democratic resolution, the committee demanded universal adult male suffrage. A few weeks before delegates gathered in Danville for the April convention, the Fayette County Committee met one last time and sought to increase its influence by broadening membership. In an announcement appearing in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette during the first week of March, committee members invited representatives not only from militia companies but also from religious societies to attend their next meeting, where it was “expected that the instructions of said committee . . . will be completed.” The impact of the militiamen’s political activism on the constitutional process was considerable. Kentucky historian Joan Coward shows that neither the county committees nor the elites dominated delegate elections. While neither side may have achieved absolute control, the election outcome marked a significant victory for committee members. Militiamen occupied a sizable number of seats at the convention, forcing the gentry to consider the interests and demands of the county committees and their constituents. A clearer indication of the militiamen’s influence is the more egalitarian elements of the state’s constitution. [ 72 ]

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These included ballot elections and universal white male suffrage. Both dramatically advanced the democratization of Kentucky’s electorate. As early as 1784, when militiamen gathered in Danville to plot the Kentucky District’s future, membership in a company provided an accessible pathway for those who desired to participate in politics. The anonymous men who made up William Henry’s Bourbon County Committee, men who worked the smaller, poorer farms in the Bluegrass Region, found in their militia company a voice to make their sentiments known to the region’s gentlemen politicians. The adoption of the 1792 constitution dampened political debate in Kentucky, but only temporarily. The ink had barely dried on copies of the document when a flutter of new essays and letters rekindled contention. The constitution included an amendment directing that another convention convene in 1799 should voters give their approval for two consecutive years. George Nicholas, the constitution’s primary architect, believed that such a provision would encourage immigration to Kentucky—something all agreed was necessary for the state’s political and economic maturation. Potential newcomers who approved of the original constitution would assume that a new convention would make no substantial revisions. Those who found specific clauses objectionable would assume that convention delegates would correct the perceived deficient sections. The inclusion of this amendment in the 1792 constitution ensured the widest popular support for the new state government. It also guaranteed that even before the new administration began to function, old combatants would renew old fights, intent on swaying public opinion to gain the advantage before 1799. The battles, at times fervent and at times feeble, persisted for seven years. One who still had a political ax to grind was William Henry, and in 1794 he returned to the pages of the Lexington Kentucky Gazette. In an extensive essay reminiscent of his earlier critiques, the old Bourbon County Committee chief criticized the powers of the governor, the bicameral legislature, patronage, and elite rule. Four years later, as the second convention approached, the county committees reformed, again condemning those of wealth and connection, and hoping to influence the anticipated rewriting of the constitution. Writing to the Frankfort Palladium, “Somebrious” recommended that “every Captain of a militia company in this county cause five men to be elected as a company committee, to consult and draw up what may seem to be a sense of the [ 73 ]

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people, and one of the same number to be chosen . . . to meet at the Capitol in Frankfort . . . to draw such remonstrance and petitions . . . to propagate the welfare of the community at large.” “A Citizen” responded to the elite’s criticisms of the militia’s committee meetings and proposals, warning of the dire consequences of aristocratic rule and the use of a professional army to rob Americans of their liberties. Praising the militia for their readiness to defend the people’s rights and freedom, he warned that without a vigilant maintenance of the institution, “dangers from without . . . or from within” could “threaten the privileges of the people. . . . The militia man may slumber—he may be deceived, but the [professional] soldier is always at this post; and ready to obey any orders he may receive from those who are ever on the watch for the most favorable moment in which he may be used for the destruction of liberty.” Despite “A Citizen’s” warning, the county committees’ influence had dissipated. William Henry fell silent, and the committees themselves played no significant part at the convention. Nevertheless, the methods that Henry and the militiamen used so effectively survived longer than the county committees. Ironically, members of the elite faction appropriated the committee system to push their agenda through the 1799 convention, successfully making the revised constitution more conservative than the original. Resolution of constitutional questions did not end the militia’s influence on politics and democratization. Given the primitive nature of communications in the early nineteenth century, candidates sought out large gatherings of likely voters to get their message out and gather supporters. Militia musters proved ideal for such politicking and became a center of campaigning. Instances of speechmaking and pressing the flesh were common whenever the militia gathered, even as early as 1791, when candidates for the final state constitutional convention campaigned at musters. In 1809 the Bardstown Rifle Company’s announcement for its July Fourth celebration included a provision that “candidates for the Legislature are requested to attend.” The practice continued for years, as the experience of one Colonel Morgan, who ran for the state senate in 1838, demonstrates. Responding to the “interrogatories of Bourbon [County] voters,” Morgan turned to the Paris Western Citizen and wrote, “Although I gave oral answers to these interrogatories at the county court in May, and at all the Battalion musters in Bourbon county, I informed the people that I would answer them through your paper.” Henry Clay, [ 74 ]

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the state’s most famous politician, contributed to his first political victory by campaigning among citizen-soldiers. Lagging in the 1803 race for the state legislature, he found himself conversing with a group of militiamen after one of their musters. One questioned the young political hopeful on his shooting skills, to which Clay responded that he was “the best in the country.” The men demanded that he demonstrate the veracity of the boast, and although he later claimed to have never shot a rifle before, Clay plugged the target close enough to the bull’s eye to win over his skeptical audience. According to Clay’s early biographer, “this unimportant incident gained him the vote of every hunter and marksman in the assembly.” Beyond simple campaigning, musters provided a readily accessible forum for discussing the day’s political issues. At a 1798 muster in Madison County, militiamen debated and passed resolutions on the crisis with France, including condemnation of the Adams administration’s policies, especially the Alien and Sedition bills. In the 1820s, as Kentucky struggled to navigate the residual effects of the 1819 economic panic, the legislature passed replevin laws. The court of appeals sparked a bitter battle between the two branches of government when in 1820 it declared one such law unconstitutional. Legislators attempted to replace the court with a new set of judges, leading to the creation of “old court” and “new court” factions. As debates filled the halls of government and the columns of newspapers, Kentuckians made their way to militia musters to hear politicians haggle over the pros and cons of each side. As was typical, after the speeches and discussions concluded, a vote was taken of the crowd’s sentiments. The results provided as much grist for the debate mill as did the speakers. The Louisville Public Advertiser’s editor warned that “[the] sentiment of the whole county is not to be inferred from the vote of a single muster, where there was nearly an equal division. . . . [L]ast Saturday, in Capt. Johnson’s company . . . there were 60 in favor of the old court, and three! yes, three in favor of the new! At several other musters, a similar vote has been given.” A week later the Public Advertiser recounted another political muster: “At a muster at Mr. Hayden’s . . . the constitutionality, policy, &c. of the late act reorganizing the Court of Appeals, was discussed by Col. Ford and Capt. Younger, two candidates, on opposite sides; after which, the vote of the company and citizens present was taken, . . . about 100 persons voting. The constitution triumphed by a majority of about three to one, not withstanding [ 75 ]

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some gentlemen of Franklin county, voted with the minority.” Recognizing the military character of their audiences at these musters, some speakers gave their speeches a martial cast, as did a Doctor Roberts, speaking at Captain Pearl’s muster in early July. “This is the point,” he told Pearl’s men, “against which the Anti-Judge Breakers, the friends of Judicial Supremacy have leveled all their artillery—upon this point they have made a dreadful and tremendous assault. The well disciplined army of Lawyers have marched in solid column to storm the citadel of freedom.” Eventually, voters elected legislators who opposed the substitution judges, ensuring the original court’s continuation. In addition to providing a forum for political discussion, the militia also continued to operate as a proto-political organization. In 1794 citizen-soldiers in southwestern Logan County ventured down the road of partisanship when they joined the bickering between two rival political factions. Governor Isaac Shelby had recently commissioned Alex Dromgoole as captain of a militia company, an appointment that apparently inflamed preexisting local animosities. “McEwin and Maulding is much chagrined at my appointment,” Dromgoole wrote to Shelby. Moreover, they planned to do “everything [in] their power to discourage the people from joining the company and went as far as to say they will raise one in opposition to my company and to get one of their own party in.” The threats of McEwin and Maulding, however, did little to ruffle the feathers of the new Captain Dromgoole, who assured the governor that their fussing and fuming gave him “no uneasiness.” In Mercer County a company of citizen-soldiers organized for political purposes, despite their claim to be “a domestic guard . . . composed of those who will be left behind when the Kentucky volunteers shall march” to war against the British. In July 1812 the proceedings of their first meeting appeared in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, and while they swore their readiness to defend the state against foreign invasion, their true motivations quickly became apparent. They described themselves as “one hundred and one qualified voters (emphasis added)” who wished to “avail themselves of that opportunity to exercise the constitutional right of Freemen; . . . to express their sentiments not only upon the business which was the immediate object of the meeting, but also upon such other subjects of a public nature as they may deem particularly interesting.” Needless to say, these militiamen found a number of things “particularly interesting.” They first affirmed their support for [ 76 ]

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President Madison and the war effort; given the conduct of Great Britain, they submitted, “No true American could hesitate to choose [war].” Their remaining resolutions turned from the military to the political. Commenting on the upcoming gubernatorial election, members of this “domestic guard” pledged their support to former governor Isaac Shelby, “a decided republican.” Shelby’s opponent, Col. Gabriel Slaughter, received no such kind words: “Out of regard to his feelings we pass over in silence what we consider his pretensions.” The Mercer militia also felt compelled, in spite of their own partisanship, to “express their indignant sense and utter detestation of the abominable practice of electioneering.” Believing it a practice “grossly insulting to Freemen,” they maintained that their candidate “had too much self respect to stoop to this disgraceful practice.” While the war against the British raged in the North, these citizen-soldiers preferred to assault their enemies on the political battlefield. Perhaps the clearest example of the militia’s proto-political activism came four years later in June 1816, when after traveling a short distance across the rolling hills of the Bluegrass Region, a small group of men gathered in Lexington to plot a strategy for seizing control of the upcoming congressional elections. In addition to sharing a similar political agenda, each belonged to one of three volunteer militia companies, those commanded by Captains Faulkner, Sullivan, and Caven. Realizing the potential electoral power of a united militia, they proposed “that each militia company in the district, shall delegate certain persons to meet at a certain place[,] . . . that they shall designate a person other than our present member [of Congress], and that each company shall pledge itself to support the individual so designated.” The plan, if accepted by their citizen-soldier brethren, would give the militia companies the capability to sway, if not in fact decide, congressional races. Like their predecessors in the Bourbon County Committee twenty years earlier, these men sought to harness the latent political power of a unified militia. Capt. John McCalla of the Lexington Light Infantry took the lead in condemning the proposals of the politically minded units. The militia existed for one purpose, McCalla and his men reaffirmed at a company meeting, and that was to “render military service.” All other issues and activities fell outside the boundaries of appropriate militia duty, and “to convert the militia of the country into an organized cabal for the purpose of promoting electioneering views or controuling the elections . . . [ 77 ]

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would be . . . as novel as dangerous.” McCalla’s men left no doubt of their position, passing a resolution “that this company highly disapproves of the proposal to send from the militia companies delegates to Higbee’s or elsewhere, to nominate a candidate for Congress.” The scolding delivered by McCalla’s men drew a defensive response from the others. Captain Caven’s men retorted, “We consider the censure . . . as unauthorized, unjust, and subversive of a permanent principle of our free government, because the meetings which they censure have not been military but civil.” They vowed their determination to continue and proclaimed their support for former U.S. Senator John Pope, if he was agreeable to standing for election. The subtext of this political skirmish was the unpopular Compensation Act of 1816, which set annual congressional salaries at $1,500. Despite support for the act from Republican icon President James Madison, George III and Lord North would have found familiar the public’s cries of corruption and tyranny. Pope, an announced opponent of compensation, responded to the militiamen’s actions by disavowing knowledge of or any role in the political activities of the various companies. Hoping to maintain his political viability with all voters regardless of their militia affiliation, Pope played both sides of the issue. The individual was sovereign and should always remain so, he affirmed, but in the interest of “concert and union” a coordinated effort among like-minded men was not necessarily detrimental to the political process—especially, we may imagine, if such men were John Pope supporters. A number of men who resided within the bounds of Captain Caven’s militia district, but who apparently were not members of his company, remained skeptical of the benefits of “concert and union,” despite Pope’s blessing. “From what part of the Constitution,” they demanded of Caven’s men, “do they pretend the right to hold that meeting for selecting a proper person to represent us in the next Congress? . . . On principle can we relinquish [the elective franchise]? . . . Can we unite in saying, that we will permit others to represent us and vote by party? No! the right is unalienable, the trust cannot be parted with.” Whether Captain Caven and his partisan militiamen met to choose a congressional candidate went unrecorded; nevertheless, this incident, like William Henry and the Bourbon County Committee’s use of the militia in 1791, demonstrates how the preexisting structure of militia units made them easily adapted to politics, and how citizen-soldiers [ 78 ]

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readily became partisan combatants. As historian C. Edward Skeen has argued, widespread public reaction to the Compensation Act marked a seminal point in the demise of deferential politics, indicating the common man’s increasing awareness of his own political influence. The militia’s role in this transformation occurred in one sense by default. Settled by whites for less than twenty years, Kentucky in 1792 was still in the early stages of development and lacked many of the established modes of social interaction that characterize a mature community. No formal, or for that matter even informal, organizations existed to give the common people a voice in the political arena. Conversely, those in the upper reaches of society naturally gravitated toward one another through a kinship of interests, thereby creating what was essentially a political fraternity. The Political Club of Danville is one example. Kentucky’s leading citizens, as a means to deliberate issues pertaining to government, formed the Political Club of Danville to debate and promote their own understanding of constitutional theories. The club first met in 1786 and counted among its members many of Kentucky’s most prominent citizens. Judges, lawyers, and those of learning and wealth met to discuss a variety of topics, including theories of government. The club played an integral part in drafting the 1792 constitution as a number of former members brought the benefits of their earlier debates to the convention as delegates. Historian John L. Brooke, in his study of political culture in Worcester County, Massachusetts, has labeled this sort of group activism as “associational politics.” The voluntary societies that Brooke identifies were not partisan by design, but as social organizations they “served to formalize and thicken relationships among the gentry, providing yet another avenue along which political information and cooperation might flow.” As William Henry and others demonstrated, the enrolled militia of the early republic provided similar social reinforcement and access to the political arena for the common man, advancing the democratization of the American electorate. Companies offered a ready-made organization, including a framework of geographic districts, an established, familiar, and popularly elected leadership, and most important, a degree of autonomy beyond the control of the country’s gentlemen. Rather than supplying another platform for the gentry, partisan companies gave a political voice to the William Henrys of the world, those who lacked the connections and influence of their more prominent neighbors. [ 79 ]

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Resolution of the state’s constitutional questions briefly calmed the state’s political waters, but the demise of the enrolled militia and the rise of Jacksonian partisanship and volunteer citizen-soldiers initiated the second era of the militia’s political life, as adjunct organizations for the Whig and Democratic parties. Like the rest of the nation, militiamen eased into partisan politics before the coming of the second party system. In 1800 Frankfort citizen-soldiers celebrated Jefferson’s electoral victory as “a majority of citizens assembled at the State House, when by order of the meeting the bell was rung, and the necessary preparations being made, the piece of artillery now in this place was fired 18 rounds.” Newspaper accounts of other celebrations described the militia’s participation and symbolic blessing of the Virginian’s victory with salutes and parades. A few weeks later, Montgomery County militiamen issued an address to the new president, pledging their support and assuring him, “You are the first of our fellow citizens in whom we wish to repose our rights, the most important of all trusts, and most sincerely congratulate you.” Jefferson responded appreciatively, promising to “cordially unite all differences of opinion under the general banner of republicanism.” The 1814 Treaty of Ghent closed the second war with Great Britain, and with peace came the misnamed “Era of Good Feelings.” The people had ostensibly taken Jefferson’s earlier declaration that “we are all Republicans, we are all Federalists” to heart, added a slight twist, and decided that they were all Republicans, with the exception of a few diehard Federalists. Feelings, nevertheless, were not so good. Despite the appearance of political unity and cooperation, serious economic, social, and political differences churned just beneath the surface. The Panic of 1819 and the 1820 battle over Missouri statehood were harbingers of future sectional and political strife. Moreover, Americans had not been as successful in throwing off the afflictions of divisiveness as first thought. Democratization continued apace, taking in more and more Americans, but politics was about to become a boisterous contest between competing ideologies. The 1824 election, which featured Kentuckian Henry Clay, Andrew Jackson, and John Quincy Adams, hinted at the impending partisan battles. Despite Clay’s political experience, after the election he moved not into the White House but into the secretary of state’s office, a new address that brought accusations from Andrew Jackson of a “corrupt bargain” between Clay and the new President Adams. Here were the seeds of the country’s second two-party system. [ 80 ]

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The animosity from the 1824 election ripened into a battle between Whigs and Democrats that lasted until the 1850s, when sectionalism shattered national political alliances. Despite the Founding Fathers’ aversion to divisive factions, Americans of this generation embraced party politics. Partisanship became commonplace, common enough that volunteer militia companies joined in by aligning themselves with Whigs or Democrats, becoming auxiliary institutions to the major parties. In early nineteenth-century South Carolina, volunteer militia gatherings increasingly became an essential stop on the campaign trail. Especially in the summer, musters attracted politicians, and by the 1840s, militia events were a central part of the campaign season. The citizensoldiers’ blend of civil and military traditions energized the political arena. In Kentucky a number of militiamen acted with an enthusiasm that betrayed no moral misgivings about being the animating force in party politics. The approach of the 1824 election prompted Christian County officers Gen. William Henry and Col. N. S. Dallam to organize a meeting in Hopkinsville to campaign for the state’s favorite son Henry Clay and his presidential aspirations. In Frankfort, Col. Peter Dudley did likewise, mustering his Twenty-second Regiment of Kentucky militiamen to confirm their commitment to Clay and express support for Nathan Sanford as the vice-presidential candidate. Once Congress declared Adams the winner in 1824, Jackson and his followers embarked on what was a four-year campaign for redemption and the White House in 1828. In Kentucky, partisan activity began a full year before the election, with some of the state’s militia officers contributing to the excitement by organizing rallies for their favorite candidate. In June 1827 Col. Henry Payne hosted a barbecue for about seven hundred “Friends of Jackson” who gathered for dinner and speeches. Leading the slate of speakers was General McCalla who “spoke first and was followed by Colonel Combs and Mr. Hunt.” Partisan activities continued for the next few months as Kentuckians prepared for the annual fall elections. In these campaigns militiamen added an exclamation point to toasts and speeches with cannon and musket fire. At a public dinner for Jackson supporters in Fayette County, the Lexington Artillery Cadets responded to each toast with “discharges of cannon,” having earlier “fired twenty-four rounds at day-light,” perhaps a tribute to the twenty-four states in the Union or a reminder of the previous presiden[ 81 ]

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tial election. Jackson loyalists were also active in Frankfort, organizing a similar dinner with toasts and appropriate salutes by the militia. Two popular activities at the politically oriented musters and holiday celebrations were toasting favorite candidates and polling the participants on the upcoming election. Clay and Jackson accounted for the great majority of salutes, with an occasional nod to specific party agendas such as internal improvements or protective tariffs. As for taking measure of the crowd’s opinions at militia gatherings, the results supposedly provided an electoral weather vane. In reality, they served more to generate enthusiasm and support than as an accurate predictor of returns. For example, in October 1824 at a regimental muster in Madison County, “it was agreed to take the opinions of the officers and soldiers on duty, & such citizens as were spectators within the lines, on the subject of the next Presidency, when it appeared there were about 700 for Jackson and between eighty and one hundred for both Adams and Clay.” Two and a half years later, Captain Clarkson’s Scott County militiamen recorded a similar outcome. The incumbent Adams did not fair well: “It appeared that Jackson had 117 and Adams 6 votes!!” Election Day results in 1828 did not disappoint Clarkson’s Democratic citizen-soldiers. Jackson’s victory carried the Tennessee general to Washington dc, initiating celebrations throughout the nation. Kentuckians participated in the appropriate manner, gathering for rallies and barbecues where Democrats reveled in the glories of victory and bourbon. Lexington and Frankfort Democrats joined to celebrate “the installation of the people’s president and the overthrow of a corrupt aristocratic faction” by sitting down to “an excellent dinner, served up in very superior style.” Militia companies in both communities welcomed the day by firing their artillery pieces. Not all celebrations turned out so well, as one newspaper reported: “Whilst the friends of General Jackson, at Winchester in this state, were firing the cannon and shouting for joy at the signal victory they had obtained, a Mr. Babcock had his right arm shot off at the shoulder; & . . . it was thought he could not survive many days.” A few Kentuckians saw the increasingly partisan tone of holidays and militia gatherings as an inappropriate distraction from the days’ true purpose. One toast maker articulated his opposition to political intrusions on Washington’s Birthday by characterizing the holiday as “neutral ground, where all of every party meet in fellowship—may it not be pol[ 82 ]

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luted by the bickerings and bitterness of party spirit.” Others agreed: “It is lamentable to behold,” noted the Louisville Public Advertiser in 1824, “the rancor of party feelings. . . . Even the anniversary of an event which was not confined . . . to any party . . . is to be degraded by the presence of this baneful spirit; and the purity of feeling which ought to be blended with its celebrations, is to be destroyed, for the gratification of political spleen and injustice.” For at least one year, in 1835, partisanship failed to make an appearance on the Fourth, prompting one reporter to remark that the “day was celebrated in Lexington, more in the ‘good old fashion,’ than we have witnessed for many years.” Despite the differing political affiliations of the guests, “harmonious and good feelings . . . appeared upon every countenance.” Five years later, celebration planners were still battling partisanship: “All political discussion will be avoided. No ardent spirits will be permitted on the ground.” Apparently they saw a connection. The two prohibitions seemingly proved successful, when “after dinner was over, the enlistments . . . were read (but not drank, as spirits were forbidden on the ground).” Although the excitement of partisan activities intoxicated many, a minority of citizen-soldiers did attempt to maintain political neutrality. In the summer of 1834 John McCalla and his Lexington Light Infantry, which had opposed the 1816 scheme to control congressional elections, refused to participate in politicians’ electioneering practices, just as they had twenty years earlier. Members of the Whig party invited the Light Infantry to join their festivities planned for the Fourth of July. The troop respectfully declined, wanting no part of “a celebration of supposed party triumphs.” Company members, “being composed of members from both the leading political parties of the day,” pointed out that, since their inception in 1789, they had “been devoted to our country, our whole country, and nothing but our country.” The Fourth of July and Washington’s Birthday were “national festivals,” days not to be marred by ideological contests. A bipartisan membership coupled with a commitment to nationalism enabled the Lexington Light Infantry to forswear party politics in its most obvious forms and remain an organization dedicated to civil and military defense. McCalla’s company, however, was fighting a losing battle. Politics was on course to acceptance and legitimacy, and in spite of the world’s McCallas, citizen-soldiers often led the way. By 1840, Whigs had endured the common man’s president, Andrew [ 83 ]

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Jackson, and his hand-picked successor, Martin Van Buren, for twelve years, but the approaching election gave them hope of changing fortunes. Anti-Jacksonites had joined forces under the banner of the Whig party and, adopting the campaigning style of their hated opponents, rallied supporters for the upcoming battle. Like the Democrats, Whig militiamen used their organizational resources and high visibility to advance their party’s cause and presidential candidate, the old Indian fighter William Henry Harrison. In the spring of 1840, Bracken County’s Gen. John Payne issued a call to his War of 1812 militia comrades, asking for their support for fellow veteran Harrison. Over the next few months citizen-soldiers answered the call as Whigs organized meetings, rallies, and conventions to stir up support. In preparation for a convention in Macon County, Bourbon County Whigs chose delegates and resolved that they should carry “with them the flag of Capt. Garrard’s troop,” which had fought in the late war. They also agreed to add the names of Harrison and Tyler to the flag’s motto, “United we stand, divided we fall.” And they further resolved “that any other of the soldiers of the late war whose names are not mentioned, be also requested to unite with and swell the delegation.” At the convention in Macon County, the Bourbon flag “was the ‘most observed of all.’” The “Flat Rock Tippecanoe Club’s” plans for an upcoming rally included “rations for Thousands, . . . music, . . . at least ten barrels of hard Cider,” and steps to ensure “the volunteer companies in this and the adjoining counties . . . [be] respectfully invited to attend.” A letter printed in the Paris Western Citizen from “A. Beatty” to the Whigs of Mason County provides a final glimpse into the pervasiveness of Whig politicking at musters. Beatty recounted that “at a Battallion muster, at Powersville, . . . the afternoon had been nearly spent by the delivery of a speech by each of the four candidates for the Senate, . . . and the three Congressional candidates. . . . A more general notice [concerning an upcoming rally] had been circulated, through the officers, assembled at the drill muster at Brookeville, that a county meeting would be held at that place on the day of the Battallion muster . . . for choosing delegates to the Blue Lick convention. At this muster it was deemed expedient . . . to postpone the election of delegates till the following Monday.” Harrison’s defeat of Van Buren initiated celebrations around the country as Whigs enjoyed the fruits of a long-awaited electoral victory. The rattle of militia muskets echoed at Whig rallies, in one instance [ 84 ]

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drawing sharp criticism from a Lexington Democrat. When Presidentelect William Henry Harrison passed through central Kentucky in late 1840, a number of militia companies greeted him as he entered the city boundaries. “The reception was pretty well got up,” wrote the disgruntled Van Buren man. “The military made a very splendid appearance, and performed their parts with an accuracy which did great credit to their discipline.” But despite the troop’s skill and efficiency, the performance “was just exactly what the getters up of it desired it should be—a party triumph. It was intended that the Democracy should feel their defeat as much as possible, and that the whigs should enjoy their triumph to the fullest extent.” The ultimate expression of the volunteer militia’s political activism came when the Hickory Artillery Company organized for the 1844 campaign. The appearance of these Fayette County volunteers at a Democratic dinner in August began a four-month whirlwind tour of barbecues and banquets. The company had formed just one week before parading at the August rally, but the sixty-five man troop marched through town well appointed. Each member sported a “black glazed cap, blue hunting shirt trimmed with yellow lace, a broad yellow belt and white pantaloons.” Unable to procure muskets, “they turned out with lances mounted on young [and surely not by accident] hickory staves.” They first stopped at Capt. Henry Johnson’s home, where they received a “beautiful ‘Star-Spangled Banner,’ made by the fair hands of [Captain Johnson’s] excellent lady and her lovely daughters. . . . The company was again formed, and marched in fine order past the ladies, who saluted them by waving their handkerchiefs.” The militiamen then took their place at the head of a procession that numbered near a thousand and escorted the gathering to Nicholasville for a rally of loyal Democrats. “Viewed as a mere exhibition of party strength,” summed up one writer, “it was very imposing—regarded as a spectacle merely, it was one of the most splendid ever witnessed in this section of the country.” Their successful debut in Fayette County and Nicholasville was followed up with parades in Versailles, Georgetown, Peyton’s Lick, Dover, and Cynthiana. When the brightly uniformed “Hickories” marched into town, Democrats expected a day of food and barbecue. In spite of the time spent touring Bluegrass towns, the artillery company still managed to keep the folks at home entertained. In September, when word reached Lexington of the overwhelming Democratic victory [ 85 ]

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in Maine, the Hickories mustered in the town square, unlimbered their field pieces, and fired a salute to the party’s success. “The thunders of their artillery,” crowed one partisan, “shook even the walls of Ashland,” home of Whig chieftain Henry Clay. Any plaster loosened in the Clay household surely crumbled completely when the Hickories turned out to celebrate Polk’s victory in November. At dawn on November 23 they awoke the countryside with a 178-gun salute. One Democrat remarked that “our political opponents looked rather downcast. . . . Much it would have rejoiced us, had the occasion been one on which all parties could have united in one general manifestation of delight.” His goodwill, however, had its limits. He warned his Whig opponents that “if differences in political opinion are hereafter to be made the ground of persecuting and proscribing democrats . . . we are ready for it—democracy can live without the aid of whiggery.” Understandably, the Hickory Artillery’s participation in party barbecues and victory celebrations made them popular among fellow Democrats in Lexington and the Bluegrass Region. Perhaps nowhere were they more popular than in the Bourbon County town of Paris, where after witnessing a company parade, a number of men joined to form the Hickory Guards, whom the original “Hickories” welcomed as “brothers in arms.” The Hickory Artillery Company is the most obvious illustration of the volunteer militia’s significance to the country’s early national political evolution. Here indeed was a company born of politics, the fulfillment of the militia’s political activism in the 1780s. In 1784, when enrolled militiamen gathered in Danville to plot the future of Virginia’s District of Kentucky, citizen-soldiers became a force for democratization. With an organizational structure that included nearly every white male of voting age, they offered a ready-made vehicle to access the political system. The citizen-soldiers of William Henry’s Bourbon County Committee found a voice to challenge the deferential, hat-in-hand customs of traditional politics. United by their militia identity, they made known their sentiments to the region’s gentlemen politicians and wielded sufficient power to make the 1792 constitution more egalitarian. The militia’s contribution to democratization continued into the 1830s and 1840s, when competing Whigs and Democrats demonstrated the viability of a two-party system. As auxiliary institutions to the major parties, volunteer companies like the Hickory Artilleries attracted large crowds to rallies and

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barbecues with parades, colorful uniforms, and noisome weapons. The thunder of cannons heralded the commencement of a spectacle not to be missed, drawing potential converts into the new national religion of partisan politics. Those who made their way to the sounds of celebration consumed food, drink, speeches, toasts, and political principles. Community and party leaders spoke of partisan ideology, party loyalty, the nation’s glorious past, and national devotion. From the 1780s until the disintegration of the second party system in the 1850s, first enrolled and then volunteer citizen-soldiers pushed democratization forward and enlivened partisan politics. A final way that the militia influenced American politics was through its contribution of candidates for elected office. Perhaps because they had already experienced the responsibilities and rewards of leadership, military men often looked at politics as a second career. Even casual students of U.S. history can recite a list of military officers turned civil servant. At the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia in the spring of 1775, a former militia officer from tidewater Virginia and veteran of the French and Indian War took command of the United States’ nascent military establishment. After serving as the nation’s top military officer for the next eight years, George Washington surrendered his sword and command to Congress with the intent of returning to Mount Vernon and the more sedate life of a Virginia gentleman planter. However, the respect and notoriety he had acquired as head of the Continental Army led to a brief retirement. Again responding to the people’s summons, the former commander-in-chief became the country’s first chief executive and thereby established the now well-traveled path to the presidency. Andrew Jackson, William Henry Harrison, Ulysses S. Grant, and Dwight Eisenhower all parlayed military careers into electoral success. The heated debates that surrounded Jackson’s campaigns illustrate the centrality of military candidates in early nineteenth-century politics. The approaching 1824 election prompted letter writer “Cato” to address his fellow Kentuckians on the presidential question. “Cato” wrote in the Louisville Public Advertiser, “Gen. Jackson is the last Revolutionary patriot, whom the nation can honor with the Presidential station, and he is highly worthy of it. . . . And now, when our independence and liberties are at stake, and endangered by a league of European tyrants abroad, and faction and corruption at home, Mr. Clay ought to

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give way to Gen. Jackson, our second Washington.” Even after voters had ensured Jackson’s victory, his supporters continued to praise his military accomplishments: Let the reader compare the services of Gen. Jackson with those of Henry Clay. Look at jackson, at the head of his brave volunteer militia, suffering every privation, and risking his life to protect the women and children on our southern frontier, from the tomahawk and scalping knife, of the merciless savage—then look at Henry Clay, perfectly at his ease, during the same period, walking on fine carpets, sleeping on beds of down, making eggnogg and gambling at Ghent, or “Capering nimbly in a lady’s chamber,” “To the lascivious breathings of a lute!” And then say whether it becomes this man, again to volunteer as the public accuser of Gen. Jackson, and insidiously endeavour to excite a prejudice against one of the greatest benefactors of his country.49

In 1828 Jackson sought the White House for a second time, to which his opponents raised the cry of “military rule.” Jacksonites shot back, asking if “the mere circumstance of a man’s having been a soldier” disqualified “him of all claims to civil distinction.” John Quincy Adams’s supporters issued an unqualified “Yes!” and made clear their belief that a Jackson victory would “lead to total subversion of our liberties” as “men like himself, rash and violent in their feelings and prejudices,” would seize control of the government. Emerging Whigs found the tables turned when William Henry Harrison challenged the Democrats for the presidency in 1840. “What do the political friends of Mr. [Henry] Clay say now, and what does he himself say? . . . Have they the same holy terror they once had in reference to military chieftains, and do they still believe that the election of a soldier will carry the republic to ruin?” Harrison’s electoral victory undoubtedly tempered lingering Whig anxieties over the thought of a military man in the White House. For “Tippecanoe,” as for Washington and scores of later officers turned candidates, the esteem and notoriety earned in warfare presaged success in politics. Although their goals were less ambitious, Kentucky’s military men were no different, frequently seeking elected office following, and sometimes during, their militia careers. Time and again, military experience proved a significant factor in political battles. From 1792 to 1850, [ 88 ]

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twelve of the state’s sixteen governors had militia experience prior to gaining office. Isaac Shelby, the first man elected to the governorship in 1792, fought with distinction in the Revolution, and during the War of 1812 he served concurrently as governor and commander-in-chief of the Kentucky militia. In the latter war, he did not lead from the comfort and safety of a desk but returned again to the field, leading fifteen hundred Kentucky volunteers at the Battle of the Thames in 1813. As Shelby and his fellow governors demonstrate, candidates and their supporters believed a military title and combat experience sufficient evidence of honor, discipline, and service to the commonweal to claim a right to office. Occasionally, however, opponents turned the tables, raising doubts about a man’s integrity and character in light of a suspect war record. Other critics questioned the wisdom of electing any military figure to a position of civil leadership. Nevertheless, the frequent and at times heated debates over candidates’ martial experiences reveal that voters considered this an important factor when choosing representatives and public officials. Well before the contentious politics of the Jacksonian period, Kentuckians made a candidate’s militia career an issue for public discussion. In an 1800 letter, “A Spectator” contemplated the issue with a degree of moderation, neither condemning nor endorsing the political aspirations of military men. “If a citizen deserves well of his country,” he wrote to the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, “either in a civil or military capacity, he should receive the approbation of his countrymen. . . . But to elect an individual to predominate in civil affairs, in consideration of his knowledge in tacticks . . . is as incongruous, as to promote an illiterate common soldier to the chief command.” For this essayist, a military uniform hanging in the closet neither recommended its owner for, nor disqualified him from, political pursuits. Many, however, were not as objective as “A Spectator.” Foremost in opposition were candidates who hoped to capitalize on their martial experience. Gen. Charles Scott led the charge when he declared his candidacy for presidential elector in the fall of 1800. The announcement expressed the hope that “the well known Republican principles of the General, his long and eminent military services, as well in the revolutionary war, as in the expeditions against the Indians, added to his decidedly expressed determination of giving his vote . . . to Mr. Jefferson” would sway voters in his favor. Two weeks later a letter writer by [ 89 ]

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the name of “An American” expressed reservations about Scott’s candidacy: “We all respect the man and the veteran because he has served his country. But we know nothing of his principles.” If Scott’s principles were indeed a mystery, a majority of voters overlooked the shortcoming to elect him anyway. A letter published on Election Day revealed the value placed on a man’s military experience when it came to politics. “A Volunteer” wrote: “It is well known that Gen scott acted a conspicuous and brave part during the revolutionary war. He was an early adventurer to Kentucky. On every occasion he was the first to oppose and subdue our barbarous savage enemy, and was a principal instrument in securing to us the peace and happiness we now enjoy. His unparalleled exertions for the welfare of our country have been too recent and notorious to be forgotten.” The letter continued: “This is probably the last opportunity we may have of expressing our gratitude and attachment for our old friend. kentucky volunteers, remember your General—Let us prove to the world that bravery and true merit shall be gratefully remembered, and receive our suffrages.” Scott’s military career again was the focus when he ran a successful race for the governorship in 1808. Critics questioned his character and ability to lead, based on allegations of misconduct, if indeed not cowardice, at the Battle of Monmouth in 1778. Defenders quickly came to his aid, but Scott had discovered what others would later learn: military experience could be a two-edged sword in the world of politics. Candidates with less fame than Scott promoted their military credentials when campaigning for office. In 1803 William Henry made no pretenses of running on the issues. “I have declared myself a candidate for Congress,” he wrote. “I think it unnecessary to detail to you my political principles; but let it suffice to say, that having myself borne a part in the revolutionary war, a recollection of the fatigues and dangers to which we were often exposed during that conflict—I say a base recollection of this independent of every other consideration, will cause me to be among the last who will relinquish that liberty, so dearly bought.” Col. William Irvine of Madison County, a candidate for presidential elector in 1804, made sure that the voters knew of the “dangers, fatigues and sufferings” he endured while “defending the early settlers from the ravages of our savage enemy.” And a supporter of one Major Chambers, Whig candidate for governor in 1839, reminded the public that “at the call of his country, during the late war, Maj. Chambers was found in the tented field; and at [ 90 ]

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the battle of the Thames, showed his willingness to offer up his life upon the alter of his country.” Creating greater interest and scrutiny, however, were the political aspirations of the day’s popular public figures. Col. Isaac Shelby’s career as Revolutionary hero and Kentucky’s first governor had made his a household name, and he was a likely winner when he ran for governor again in 1812. Throughout the summer campaigning season, Lexington’s newspaper published letters almost weekly that lauded the integrity, character, and firmness of the aging militia officer. Virtually ignoring Shelby’s term as the state’s first chief executive, writers instead recalled his martial exploits, which was not surprising given that Great Britain threatened anew. What Kentucky needed in a time of crisis, according to letter writer “Seventy-Six,” was “a governor able to manage our civil concerns or marshal our armies in the field of battle.” Even the National Intelligencer in Washington called on Kentuckians to elect the “Hero of King’s Mountain.” Others were not so easily impressed. “That Col. Shelby is brave I do not doubt; But who is not?” Abinidab Hardwood asked of other Kentuckians. “To be brave is almost an hereditary virtue in America. . . . The whole continent of North and South America would not furnish states enough, if we wanted to make every brave soldier a governor! . . . If [Shelby] really pants in his gray hairs for military glory, let him serve as an officer in the army, then he will certainly have an opportunity to exchange a pistol with the English or a tomahawk with the Indians, without being governor of Kentucky.” The fact that Shelby’s opponent, Gabriel Slaughter, also held the rank of colonel in the Kentucky militia apparently did not concern Hardwood. The vituperative nature of the 1812 election and the challenges Shelby faced over his military record and alleged aspirations for additional martial glory pale in comparison to the attacks that Gen. John Adair endured in 1820. Although three of the four gubernatorial candidates carried military titles, Adair attracted the most praise, as well as the most criticism, for his record on the battlefield. He had seen action in the Revolution, the Indian wars, and the War of 1812. The general, because of his military record, was well known to Kentuckians. Supporters who announced his candidacy assumed that “his valuable and faithful services” were “too well known to the community to require detail. Known merit will be rewarded.” In Russellville, writer “A Citizen” [ 91 ]

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advised his neighbors, “You have it now in your power to remunerate your old veteran soldier Gen. Adair, for the many signal services that he has rendered his country. . . . I have ever held it to be a sound and correct principle, that the soldiers of the revolution, where they have qualifications should be preferred to any other man as they were instrumental in securing to us the blessing of independence. . . . I therefore assert, that we are bound in gratitude to vote for the venerable old soldier.” According to another writer, however, Adair’s militia uniform concealed more than one skeleton in his closet: “Old objections to him have been pretty much veiled by his recent military services.” A few months later Adair found himself under attack on a number of fronts. The most direct assault came from “Querist,” who challenged Adair’s honor and fitness to lead, accusing him of “shrink[ing] from the honorable command” at the Battle of New Orleans in 1815. According to “Querist,” after the British had repulsed a contingent of Kentucky troops, General Jackson offered Adair the command of the Kentucky forces and an opportunity to counterattack, an offer Adair allegedly declined on account of a physical disability. In a report to the War Department, Jackson accused the Kentuckians of having “ingloriously fled,” but a military inquiry following the war exonerated both the Kentucky commander and his troops of inappropriate behavior. Nevertheless, “Querist” condemned Adair, not for cowardice but for a failure to “believe that the Kentucky militia could be trusted on such an occasion . . . therefore refus[ing] to lead them to action.” Could the people of Kentucky, demanded “Querist,” now accept this man as their “champion of honor,” their next governor and commander of the state’s militia? The editor of the Lexington Kentucky Gazette speculated on Adair’s popularity and pointed to the general’s exaggerated military reputation: “A military character, much higher than his opportunities in military operations deserve, is no doubt the cause of this.” The newspaper man was at a loss to explain this phenomenon. “The mere circumstance of his being on the battle ground . . . does not place him above thousands of other Kentuckians who . . . shouldered their rifles and advanced to the defense of their country’s rights.” Put succinctly by “A Kentuckian,” “He done his duty—no more.” Another writer, “Marcus,” warned voters against “the mad military enthusiasm which threatens to advance a corrupt politician to the most important office in . . . Kentucky.” Despite this

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criticism, Adair did advance, winning the 1820 election and becoming Kentucky’s seventh governor. As the careers of Isaac Shelby, John Adair, and others demonstrate, military experience served political candidates well. The path to political success often followed a course through the battlefield or muster ground. Following Adair’s election in 1820, however, national politics increasingly absorbed the attention and energies of Kentuckians. State and county races became sideshows to the main event of presidential elections. One Kentuckian’s militia experience did allow him to play a part on the national political stage during the presidential campaigns of the 1830s and early 1840s. Col. Richard M. Johnson’s success in the political arena was surpassed only by his renown as a soldier. A Kentucky native, he enjoyed a lengthy if not notable career in politics. He served almost continuously for four decades, alternating between the Kentucky state legislature and the United States House or Senate. In 1836 he won election to the vice presidency, accompanying Martin Van Buren to Washington. Johnson’s political career, however, never brought the accolades that followed the War of 1812. He allegedly killed the fearsome Indian chief Tecumseh after suffering a wound during the 1813 Battle of the Thames. Whether Johnson actually slew Tecumseh is unknown, but all records indicate that the colonel acted with distinction and bravery. Johnson’s political backers never hesitated to remind voters of the sacrifices made and victories won by their battle-scarred veteranturned-candidate. His wounds attracted attention from friend and foe alike. One political opponent acknowledged that Johnson had indeed suffered an injury during the war, but that “he never shews his wounds, [and] for this there is good reason. He received them at a moment his scared horse was flying from the enemy, and he cannot exhibit the scars without an indecent exposure of his person.” The indignities of partisan politics apparently spared no man, war hero or not, but Johnson’s war wounds had their defenders as well. A biography written after his tenure as vice president recalled the 1816 congressional campaign, the colonel’s first after the war. “While addressing the people,” related the author, “as he raised his hand to make a gesture, its mutilated appearance from the wound by Tecumseh’s rifle attracted attention, and the cry spontaneously ran through the multitude, ‘That hand was broken in

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our defense. We will still nourish it, and still confide in him who wears it.’ The shout closed the address, and they gave him their votes.” Twenty years after the battle, Johnson’s wounds still made good politics. John C. Bucher reminded a meeting of Dauphin County Democrats in 1842 that Johnson’s “yet reeking wounds are among the strongest evidences of [his] devotion to the honor and best interests of his country.” Despite Bucher’s hyperbole, his sentiments were likely genuine and were shared by fellow Kentuckians, who believed Johnson had earned their gratitude and, more important, their votes because of his war record. An editorial in 1840 listed among the reasons to support Johnson in the upcoming election his conduct against the British when he “organized a regiment of mounted gunmen—flew to the frontiers, and crushed at the Thames in a single charge the crimson hirelings of Britain and their cut-throat allies. . . . What better reason could be given for our preference?” Citizens in Harrisburg shared similar sentiments and at a rally for the colonel expressed their “determination to reward the ‘war worn soldier’ with a nation’s gratitude.” By the 1840s Johnson’s performance in the War of 1812 was making the transition from memory to mythology. One author credits Johnson with almost single-handedly defeating the entire British army: “In that one battle, he captured the whole British regular force, (except their commander, who escaped by the steelness of his steed) slew the great Tecumseh, defeated and set to flight fifteen hundred savages, terminated the war in that section, and put an end to the Indian massacres which had so dreadfully raged in all the northwestern frontier.” Other candidates of this era, like Johnson, hoped to convert their militia experience into votes. In 1825 one Kentuckian reflected that seemingly every candidate had a military title appended to his name. As Kentucky coped with the lingering effects of the Panic of 1819 and struggled to develop a sound economic strategy, the writer bemoaned the consequences of mixing the militia with the political economy: “The war has thrown upon society a mass of sixty day’s Majors, aide-de-camps to militia generals, &c. &c. some of whom from having worn swords & all of whom from having eaten public beef, [believed they] were qualified for the Legislature. . . . They proclaimed the doctrine of vox populi, vox Dei—that the people could do everything & that they themselves were the people.” Little had changed two years later when the Lexington Kentucky Gazette noted the “military cast” that filled recent electoral tick[ 94 ]

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ets. Commenting on a list of legislative candidates, of whom all but two carried a military rank, the newspaper advised the “military chieftains” to “commence beating up for recruits as soon as possible. The necessary quota we think will be hard to raise.” In 1831 “An Old Farmer’s” observations on the slate of gubernatorial candidates revealed the pervasiveness of militiamen in politics: The first Candidate on the field, is james cogswell. Perhaps I should say Col. Cogswell—but I am a little of a Quaker with respect to names, and like the plain old-fashioned way of calling men, as I called them when they were boys and schoolmates. The word “Colonel,” when analyzed, has too much of the military in it for me, in these peaceable times. It sounds big, but when examined only as a bubble, that rises, rounds, then bursts and dies. . . . The next Candidate is E. Thurston, or as his name is announced, Maj. E. Thurston. . . . No doubt he thinks himself qualified for the office to which he aspires, and he shows some bravery, as he has marched into the field flat-footed, as Majors and Colonels ought to do. Next comes into the field the plain Farmer, jesse kennedy, without Colonel, Major, Captain, or Mr. to his name! Well done Jesse! . . . And last, not least, General james garrard steps into the field. I shall dispense with commenting on his military appellation, as I remember well, he once saw a day that tried men’s souls, which the whitened bones on the plains of [the River] Raisin, will testify to this day.

A week later a writer named “Justice” answered, noting that a number of writers had commented, “with not a little severity, upon the military titles of some of [the candidates], (and which all hold, but perhaps unknown to the ‘Old Farmer’).” Defending military candidates, “Justice” went on: “Why is it, that in our happy country, it is unnecessary to keep up large standing armies (burthensome to the people, and dangerous to liberty,) for national defence? It is because every man is a citizen soldier, in whose bosom burns a flame of patriotism that prompts him, upon any emergency, to march forth in his country’s defence.” Who then better to safeguard the peacetime halls of government? Adding to the suspicion of militiamen’s political aspirations were candidates who made specious claims of rank and honor. In 1828 the Lexington Reporter discovered that “Major” Thomas Smith was not quite what he presented himself to be. Claiming the rank from the War of 1812, “Major Smith” was in fact “better suited to another station. He acted as [ 95 ]

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a cook, in which capacity he covered himself with laurels. . . . We are also informed that the Major had a great genius for eating as well as cooking, and that he devoured lots of ‘Uncle Sam’s’ Beef.” Smith’s willingness to fabricate a commission as a major makes evident the importance Americans placed on martial experience in a political campaign. The emphasis on a candidate’s military record is not surprising. Historian Mark E. Kann has shown that since the ancients, men have proven themselves in an all-male environment where initiative and strength of body and character established civic reputations and justified claims to leadership. On the American frontier, those who participated in the militia had the opportunity to scrutinize and be scrutinized by their fellow citizen-soldiers and to judge for themselves who rightly deserved to lead, whether in battle or the halls of government. Rohrbough finds that Kentuckians held “the successful military experience as the mark of personal leadership and the foundation of a call upon the electorate for office. . . . To succeed in political life, one best have militia command.” Time and again, the electorate demonstrated that when faced with a choice between a citizen-soldier and a plain citizen, they cast their lot with the military man who had already proven his character, mettle, and leadership. The enrolled militiamen who gathered in Danville under the leadership of Col. William Fleming in November 1784 surely never imagined that their efforts to cope with the adversities of frontier life in Kentucky would evolve into a movement for independence from Virginia, the writing of a state constitution, and eventually the establishment of a mature two-party political system. Nor could they have envisioned the role their fellow militiamen would play in those events. In a region isolated from the security and social institutions of the East, self-preservation necessitated the immediate implementation of a uniform militia system for defense against hostile Indians. Because of their organizational structure, the enrolled militia system provided settlers with a ready-made vehicle for political participation, demonstrated first by Colonels Fleming and Shelby at the 1784 meeting. Men of lesser means, like William Henry and his Bourbon County Committee, used the enrolled militia to gain access to the political process, in their case the drafting of the state’s first constitution. With their demands for universal white male

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suffrage, they successfully expanded the electorate, furthering the process of democratization begun with the Revolution. The all but statutory death of the enrolled militia after the War of 1812 and the subsequent rise to prominence of volunteer companies led to the direct participation of citizen-soldiers in the increasingly partisan politics of the nineteenth century. Serving as auxiliaries to the Whig and Democratic parties, volunteer militiamen used their showmanship and public notoriety to attract and involve citizens in party festivities and to convey political ideologies. In addition, individual officers parlayed their military titles and experiences into second careers as representatives, governors, and even vice presidents. As Kentucky evolved from a collection of vulnerable frontier outposts to the economic and political center of the American West, the state’s militia evolved as well. From the small gathering of enrolled militiamen in Danville to the thundering celebrations of the volunteer Hickory Artillery Company in Lexington, citizen-soldiers participated in and contributed to the establishment and development of Kentucky politics. The militia’s structure, pervasiveness in society, and high visibility as well as the notoriety of its officers granted it significant influence to promote and legitimate the political transformation of America.

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The men who came of age after the American Revolution could easily have identified with Thomas Paine’s 1776 observation that the times were trying for men’s souls. Although ratification of the Constitution settled the issue of an American system of government, the country struggled to preserve its independence, adjust to the volatile market economy, and shape a national identity. Social and political disorder threatened to overwhelm the nation as the post-Revolutionary generation appropriated the sacred ideal of liberty and seemingly perverted it to justify luxury, vice, and even corruption. The nation’s growing pains also created a crisis of confidence among white males as Americans’ definition of masculinity began to change. The eighteenth-century model of manhood, identified by historians as “republican” or “communal,” set forth that males, as heads of households, place the community good above individual desires, that they subordinate self-interest to the commonweal. In the early nineteenth century, this accepted gender construct came under assault from the market economy’s protagonist, the “liberal” or “self-made man,” who unapologetically pursued wealth, power, and advancement. Before and during the Revolutionary era, virtue was the essential characteristic of the communal man. A sense of duty to one’s community and fulfilling that responsibility as a civically minded citizen established an individual’s claim to manhood. Classical republican ideology posits a similar notion in the ideal of civic virtue—that is, the subordination and sacrifice of self-interest and personal aspirations for the good of the community. Historian Ruth Bloch maintains that this was “an inherently masculine trait.” Communal manhood endured in the American psyche as the trials of the Revolution gave way to the challenges of nation building. But as the United States took the first steps toward legitimacy, another revolution [ 98 ]

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of sorts was under way. In his study of Andrew Jackson, John William Ward describes the years of the early republic as a period of transition during which change was the byword. As the nation stretched westward, people traveled up the social scale, carried by economic prosperity and the transformation from a barter system to a market economy. This revolution swept through the United States as the market economy drew workers from farm to factory, replaced the independent artisan with wage laborers, and made competitiveness an admired quality. Selfinterest, the bane of eighteenth-century republicanism, began to take on a degree of legitimacy and acceptance. Success and prosperity were the rewards of ambition and assertiveness, characteristics no longer disparaged. Increasingly, the individual felt no obligation to surrender personal aspirations to a nebulous, ill-defined common good. What predominated, Anthony Rotundo suggests, “were the concerns of the self—self-improvement, self-control, self-interest, self-advancement.” Although family prominence survived the rise of the self-made man, this new American male saw economic security and challenges to arbitrary authority—not the old subordination of dreams to the common good or submission to men who had already realized the rewards of pursuing personal gain—as the best course to secure his family’s prosperity. These shifting components of manhood were not the only source of anxiety among American men in the early nineteenth century. Widespread land ownership, the fountainhead of republican independence and the key to capitalism for most Americans, also gave the common farmer the means and opportunity to question, if not directly challenge, his social and economic betters. Jefferson’s pronouncements of equality and liberty roused the common man’s determination and voice, and unquestioned submission to elite authority began to wane. According to Rotundo, by the early nineteenth century, society increasingly saw a man as “one who resisted arbitrary authority, who refused submission.” In sum, declining deference, waning civic virtue, and waxing self-interest all created a “culture shock of massive, inassimilable change that left men disoriented . . . and filled with both awe and fear.” The transition from communal to self-made man initiated a crisis of masculinity. Political leaders, clergy, and social critics bemoaned the decline in traditional values as men increasingly abandoned commitment to their communities for self-enrichment. Those who chose this course appeared to cast aside the qualities that for generations had iden[ 99 ]

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tified American manhood. What it meant to be a man became lost in a whirlwind of confusing, contradictory, and contested values and ideals. Men of the Revolutionary era had grounded their masculinity on a set of norms that now appeared antiquated, made obsolete as democratization and the market economy swept the nation into the nineteenth century. Their sons struggled to make sense of conflicting expectations that pitted an inherited responsibility to the community against the seductive call to self-enrichment. Historian and sociologist Michael Kimmel argues that the men of this generation “yearned for a place where they could reestablish their manhood and replace market competition with male camaraderie.” Many found such a refuge of masculinity in the military experience and martial qualities of a soldier. Well before Marine Gen. Robert H. Barrow made his late twentieth-century observation that “war is a man’s work,” peoples across time and space had recognized a relationship between a military experience and manhood. Peter Stearns, in his sociological study of masculinity, traces the origin of this pairing to the classical civilizations of Greece and Rome, where the ancients associated valor, daring, and physical fitness with a manly persona. Germanic cultures celebrated like qualities, praising men who excelled in hunt and battle. Modern western culture embraced these notions and continued to recognize a martial spirit and its related skills as proof of masculinity. This connection between war and manhood is pervasive, according to Joshua Goldstein’s War and Gender. Goldstein finds that the relationship “is more stable, across cultures and through time, than are either gender roles outside of war or the forms and frequency of war itself,” and that “the military provides the main remnant of traditional manhoodmaking rituals.” For men in the early republic, especially following the War of 1812, the military-masculine relationship found expression in the elite volunteer militia. Enduring as a citadel of unambiguous manhood, the militia gave males a way to make their masculinity evident to their communities and, perhaps more importantly, to themselves. The volunteer militia provided a martial experience that reinforced and conveyed centuries-old concepts of appropriate male behavior and masculine gender construction, thereby assuaging men’s anxieties. This chapter examines these qualities, revered by the ancient Greeks and Romans, recognized by America’s founding generation, and demonstrated through a militia culture. [ 100 ]

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Beyond the militia’s martial culture, participation also carried the risk, or as some saw it the opportunity, of going to war. Uniforms and military training conveyed a degree of manliness, but facing a hostile enemy and the possibility of death on the battlefield was the ultimate discriminator of manhood. In battle a man tested the strength of his character, the core element of his masculine identity. In combat the volunteer militiaman hoped to prove himself worthy of the martial legacy of his forefathers—the Revolutionaries of 1776 and the heroes of 1812—and ensure himself honor in the community’s collective memory as a true man. In 1846 Capt. Robert F. Pullman of the Allen County Volunteers expressed the collective wish of his citizen-soldier brothers to test themselves in battle. Petitioning Governor William Owsley to send his company to the Mexican War, Pullman wrote, “Give us a chance, we want to see if we can fight.” The significance of combat to men’s masculine identity is the subject of chapter 7. For centuries, Western cultures recognized the inseparable link between a martial experience and manhood, even as other masculine qualities were redefined. In the nineteenth century, despite the transition to a market economy and the consequent evolution of masculinity, Americans continued to associate the military with manhood, a relationship most men experienced as citizen-soldiers. For centuries, each generation had passed to the next the militia’s organizational structure and its culture and ethos of martial skills and masculine ideals. In the nineteenth century, these institutional characteristics continued to define the militia as a masculine organization and, by association, those who participated as men. Five elements emerge from the historical record as part of this masculine militia culture. The first is a constellation of personal qualities associated with a manly, martial bearing. From ancient times, attributes like courage, honor, and discipline characterized both soldiers and men, and this relationship continued to resonate among nineteenth-century Americans. Second, the militia helped to create and sustain a unified male community. Citizen-soldiers experienced a fraternalism that bridged class differences while at the same time maintaining their companies’ hierarchical military order. Third, the militia was an exclusionary institution, restricting participation to white men. The exclusion of women and racial and ethnic minorities supported the social hierarchy [ 101 ]

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while reinforcing the power and collective self-identity of white men. Fourth, the martial responsibilities of the militia encouraged the development of a weapons culture that further bound the militia to manliness. Weapons proficiency was a distinctly male trait, a skill expected of men who as responsible citizens were supposed to leave the plow and pick up a musket to defend their homes and country. Similarly, by the 1830s, uniforms had become the hallmark of volunteer units, as militiamen sought public attention at celebrations and ceremonies. The uniforms’ garish designs and bright colors established a clear demarcation between company members and “others,” typically white males of questionable social status, women, and minorities. Finally, training based on military drill became popular as a way to inculcate military skills and a manly bearing in young men. Whether formal and state-sponsored or informal and private, military training supposedly provided instruction in all the arts necessary to become a proficient citizen-soldier, and thus a man. Collectively, these institutional characteristics conferred a masculine identity on nineteenth-century males. As it had for generations, the militia mustered as a bastion of manhood in a world of changing gender norms. The qualities associated with a martial, masculine persona provide a starting point for uncovering the militia’s significance to the construction of manhood, but such a study is fraught with obstacles. Identifying, defining, and understanding the male gender constructs that nineteenth-century Americans rarely expressed in a straightforward manner is no simple undertaking. Indeed, Donald Mrozak questions whether the meaning of manhood is even recoverable. His concern is that the meaning of masculinity in relation to the military too closely resembles the general quality of character. However, political scientists Mark E. Kann and R. Claire Snyder have produced studies that examine masculinity and its associated traits. Kann argues in his study of masculinity’s role in the founding of America that “the founders employed a ‘grammar of manhood’ to encourage American men to reform themselves, to restore order to the hierarchical ranks of men, and to foster social stability, political legitimacy, and patriarchal power.” Kann identifies expressions that promoted order and unity among white men by reinforcing a deferential social hierarchy and by emphasizing a shared experience in contrast to the “others” of society. Snyder’s more theoretical analysis of gender and citizen-soldiers begins with the traditions of [ 102 ]

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civic republicanism, especially the works of Machiavelli and Rousseau, to establish the link between the ideals of civic virtue and manhood, qualities best demonstrated by a man’s responsibility to defend home and country. Militia service was an essential part of one’s manhood. Like Kann, Snyder finds that the virtues of citizen-soldiers—“patriotism, fraternity, and civic virtue”—expressed the relationship between the militia and masculinity. Kentuckians in the early republic implicitly accepted that these traits bound manhood to the militia experience. The martial/masculine characteristics of discipline, duty, patriotism, honor, chivalry, courage, and bravery, which were valued by the ancients, remained unchanged and continued to link soldier to man. Discipline and self-restraint resonated in the Protestant tradition, especially Calvinism, which demanded self-control in one’s personal as well as public life. Historian Jack Greene, in his study of virtue in eighteenth-century colonial America, points out that sermons and pamphlets promoted both civic and moral virtue. These ideals emphasized personal restraint and the ability to master one’s passions and vices, characteristics necessary in a society lacking the hereditary social restrictions of the Old World. Furthermore, an adolescent’s ability to gain control over his emotions indicated he was maturing from boyhood into manhood. Eighteenth-century educator Guts Muth made clear in his Gymnastics for Youth (1793) that physical, mental, and moral discipline worked together to produce “manly courage” and a “manly spirit.” John Locke made a direct connection between the ability to control one’s passions and participation in the militia. As a citizen-soldier, a man subordinated self-interest to defend his community, thereby developing a sense of self-control and level-headedness. Furthermore, selfrestraint informed Revolutionary ideology as America’s leaders encouraged an animated fervor for independence tempered by the coolness of individual passions. Patriots were energized for liberty but always with the self-control of a mature and sober man. During the nation’s second war with Great Britain, John C. Calhoun and Henry Clay recognized the necessity of inner strength and control and challenged American males to give proof of their mettle. Calhoun, in his War Report to Congress, admonished men to brandish their resolve and never “surrender . . . their rights” but to fight and achieve a “manly vindication of them.” Clay declared his expectation that his fellow countrymen would meet the [ 103 ]

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challenge with “firmness and vigor becoming freemen.” The necessity of discipline and self-control had not diminished by the 1860s. In the Civil War, most men experienced a “hardening” process as they adjusted to the rigors of military life and confronted violence, death, and the instinct to flee, which could steal one’s manhood. Only those who demonstrated a sufficient degree of mental toughness and discipline could survive the experience and emerge with their manhood confirmed. In the years between the Revolution and the Civil War, Kentuckians recognized the relationship between discipline and a manly bearing and worked to achieve those qualities and instill them in others. Militia officers began by pointing out to their men that self-discipline was necessary in camp as well as in battle. In 1813 A. H. Holmes, the commanding officer of Kentucky troops stationed at Fort Meigs, warned his young officers that too often they “imagine that bravery is the only qualification . . . necessary for them to possess.” “Forbearance and patience,” the general admonished, were just as important as courage. A year earlier Gen. James Winchester threatened confinement and court-martial to those among his men whose lack of self-restraint resulted in “wrastling and drawing tomahawks or knives over each other,” conduct that was “very unlike a soldier.” Even in defeat officers recognized discipline and self-control. Following his disastrous campaign against the Miami in 1791, Gen. Arthur St. Clair still found the calmness and “orderly behavior” of the Kentuckians noteworthy. In the 1840s, prudence and level-headedness continued to distinguish an individual as a good soldier and a man. In 1845 James H. Miller received the recommendation of A. H. Caldwell of the Fourth Regiment, Kentucky Volunteers, as a “sober sensible man,” characteristics that qualified him “in an eminent degree for the office [captain] to which he has been elected.” Knox County resident and prospective captain Silar Woodrow was a “high toned Gentleman, sober, prudent, and as chivalrous as any of Kentucky’s native son[s].” Likewise, Captain Forbes of Scott County displayed “every qualification for a good officer,” especially “discipline” and “good sense.” Equally important to masculinity was a man’s duty to his neighbors and country. Rotundo has shown a direct link between manhood and duty, pointing out that a man had to “learn submission to superiors, to fate, to duty itself,” and the greatest duty was the call to arms, a willing-

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ness to leave fields and family and possibly sacrifice his life for the sake of kin, community, and country. Some had to be reminded, and at times not so subtly, of their duty and obligation to family and nation. During the War of 1812, one volunteer, having gotten his fill of military life before his enlistment was up, headed for home. He received less than a warm welcome upon his arrival. His wife “refused speaking to him or having anything to do with him” unless he returned to his comrades. The wayward soldier shouldered his knapsack and re-measured his steps back to the war, tail undoubtedly between his legs. In 1814, Secretary of War Gen. John Armstrong admonished the troops to “spare neither labor nor sacrifice to gain a competent knowledge of your duty.” For those unsure of exactly what duty entailed, the Lexington Kentucky Gazette made it clear: Kentuckians were expected to be “devoted to the cause . . . always ready to become soldiers, and to sacrifice their lives for their country.” As was the case for the men who demonstrated discipline and self-control, those who carried out their duties were sure to receive the thanks and praise of community and commanders. Col. William Johnson of the Kentucky militia, who died at Fort Meigs in 1814, was eulogized as a man who “sacrificed domestic comforts, and inglorious ease, to the more noble and hazardous life of a soldier.” Loss of life, as in Johnson’s case, ensured that the fallen warrior would receive gratitude and honor, but duty could be met by less extreme means. The mounted riflemen who participated in the campaigns of 1812 accepted the thanks of their officers “for the promptitude which they have shown on every occasion, to obey . . . orders and to perform their duty.” During the Mexican War, only a limited number of troops had the opportunity to join the fight, creating fierce competition among companies. Some sought to assure the governor of their commitment to duty and their desire to sacrifice whatever was necessary. A Russell County company pledged to Governor Owsley its willingness to carry out orders, to “hold themselves in readiness to obey any call that might be made on them . . . in defending their country.” Patriotism was a specific duty that Americans found compelling, as Alexis de Tocqueville observed in 1835: “Nothing is more embarrassing, in the ordinary intercourse of life, than this irritable patriotism of the Americans.” Commenting on the consequences of this fervor,

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he observed that “like all instinctive passions, this kind of patriotism incites great transient exertions.” Kentuckians emphasized the “exertions” of patriotism to encourage manly behavior and participation in militia expeditions. From the first decade of the nineteenth century until the Mexican War, recruiters promoted patriotism to obviate the necessity of implementing a draft when a crisis demanded the mustering of troops. In 1803, as relations with Spain deteriorated over control of New Orleans, Kentuckians responded with enthusiasm to a call for four thousand volunteers. The Lexington Kentucky Gazette reported that a “patriotic spirit” had spread throughout the state as men volunteered to fill the requested quota. One community, however, received a writer’s censure when it failed to react with sufficient energy: “We have heard of but one company in which the men have appeared backward—in that . . . they were obliged to resort to a draft. We hope our information is incorrect.” Five years later a now anonymous colonel reminded his men of their past patriotism and expressed concern that they had perhaps lost this virtue. In his regimental orders he called for a volunteer muster the following week, noting that he could not “for a moment permit himself to believe” that in his regiment, in which “so much patriotism was displayed” in the past, it would be necessary “when danger threatens . . . to determine by draft” who would come to the country’s defense. Expectations remained unchanged when war with Great Britain came again in 1812. “Our fellow citizens,” read the Kentucky Gazette in December 1812, “promise themselves much from the valour and patriotism of our volunteers, and the skill and head of [William Henry] Harrison. Valour, patriotism, and mind, can do much.” When Isaac Shelby, Kentucky governor and commander-in-chief of the militia, proclaimed August 31, 1813, as the day for a general rendezvous of volunteers, he employed the same theme, declaring his hope that “the ardor and patriotism of my countrymen has not abated.” His countrymen, however, failed to meet his expectations. Less then two weeks before the muster, Shelby wrote to William Henry Harrison, expressing his consternation at the apparent lack of enthusiasm for the expedition. “I never have been so far disappointed in the patriotism of my countrymen,” Shelby confessed, “and am at a loss to what cause to attribute their backwardness.” Gen. John Adair, aide-de-camp to Shelby, was as perplexed as his commander. In his orders for August 24, 1813, he deemed it necessary “once

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more, to appeal to the patriotism of the second regiment of cavalry to afford their aid in the cause of our country, . . . [with the hope] that they will not suffer themselves to be outstripped in point of public spirit, by the rest of our fellow citizens.” As the war dragged into another year, appeals to patriotism remained at the forefront of efforts to maintain both morale and enlistments. “Are you an honest man?” Kentuckians read in their newspapers. “Are you a man of honor? . . . Does your bosum glow with the holy fervor of Patriotism?” Such are Kentuckians, argued one individual, “that no event can depress their ardor, and no private considerations prevent the practical display of patriotism.” He continued by noting that the Forty-second Regiment of militia exhibited a patriotism “worthy of republican Kentucky and reflects lustre on the American character generally.” The Mexican War called to battle another generation of young men, and the power of patriotism to motivate remained unchanged. When Secretary of War W. L. Marcy wrote to Governor William Owsley in 1845, he conveyed his expectation of and trust in the “zeal and public spirit of the gallant militia of Kentucky. . . . From the known patriotism and military ardor of the militia of your State, it is presumed that volunteers . . . will readily tender their service to their country.” This time the Kentucky militia did not disappoint. Their response was overwhelming, with nearly ten thousand men volunteering for twenty-five hundred positions. A company from Clark County considered itself among the fortunate when, despite their late application, the Secretary of War agreed to accept the unit for duty. “In view of the patriotic spirit manifested by the company in question,” the Secretary wrote to the militia’s commanders, “in their urgent desire for service, the Department regrets they were left out . . . [and] it agrees to receive them as a company of infantry.” At war’s end, Governor Owsley expressed his thanks and respect for those who fell at the Battle of Buena Vista, especially noting “the motives of lofty patriotism by which they were induced to enter the service of their country, their heroic valor and distinguished services in battles, and the glory of their death.” In this message delivered to the state legislature, Owsley captured patriotism’s importance to the war effort, but more subtly, his words illustrate the significance of patriotism to the construction of masculinity. Not only did appeals to patriotism encourage enlistments, they encouraged men to risk everything

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on the battlefield for honor and glory, to prove their independence, discipline, and courage to themselves as well as others; battle would prove their manhood. Another attribute that connected the martial to the masculine was honor, described by historian Bertram Wyatt-Brown as “a set of prescriptions endowed with an almost sacred symbolism.” In 1813 Gen. Green Clay pointed out to his troops encamped at Fort Meigs that it is “not in the field alone that the soldier gathers honors” and that while their deeds might garner them honor and the country’s praise, improper behavior would conversely bring shame. Those found guilty of breaking the law or disobeying orders while under his command were likely to be “drummed out of Camp with the Rogue’s March,” along with the more damning sentence of being deemed “unworthy [of] the honor of being called a Soldier.” In a letter published in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette in 1814, a colonel emphasized the necessity of drill, discipline, and proper training for his troops, but of paramount importance was honor. “The best discipline should have the place of honor, and honor,” he emphasized, “is attached to the place of danger.” An 1843 biography of Col. Richard M. Johnson, the hero of the 1813 Battle of the Thames, governor of Kentucky, and vice president of the United States, described him as possessing a “high sense of honor.” Col. M. H. Webb of Brownsville saw the opportunity to gain honor in the Mexican War by offering his regiment to the governor: “If your excellency should deem my services needed in prosecuting the war with Mexico you will confer an honor on your humble servant by permitting him to muster and march into service a Regiment.” Closely associated with honor and coveted in a similar fashion was the appellation of gentleman. During the Mexican War, as Governor Owsley began to appoint men to fill officers’ positions, Kentuckians from across the state flooded the chief executive with recommendations attesting to their favorite’s qualifications. Frequently noted was the prospective officer’s distinction of being a gentleman and usually a man of good character. W. G. Bullock of Louisville described his candidate, a descendant of Daniel Boone no less, as “a gentleman of very good intellect and high moral character.” Richmond resident Colonel Caldwell was “a gentleman of high standing and capacity,” while Maj. Samuel Owings impressed Louisville residents as “a gentleman of high moral worth.”

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Silar Woodrow was both a “high toned Gentleman” and “as chivalrous as any of Kentucky’s native son.” Some argued that simply possessing the qualities of a gentleman entitled a man to a command. “His gentlemanly bearing,” A. H. Caldwell said of James Miller, “qualifies him in an eminent degree for the office to which he has been elected.” And according to Shelbyville resident James O’Bannon, his friend Humphrey Marshall measured up as “a gentleman every way qualified to take command of the regiment.” Personal wealth, despite fitting hand in glove with being a gentleman, was not necessarily a requirement. Alexander Miller of Silver Creek in Madison County described Madison Bowlware as “a gentleman in every sense of the word.” Despite his “misfortune to be but poor in this world’s goods,” Miller wrote, Bowlware “labours hard as a farmer and is much respected.” War of 1812 veterans Col. Young Ewing and Maj. James Ruffin displayed many of the characteristics associated with a martial persona, being “gentlemen of the first respectability—firm, manly, honorable, and intelligent.” The quality most identified with a martial and masculine identity was courage. Sociologist Peter Stearns notes that “physical courage, aggressiveness, and displays of prowess ranked high among the virtues” associated with manliness. To be a “real man,” one had to possess the “essential ingredient . . . of raw physical courage and the moral resources necessary to sustain that courage.” Mark E. Kann perhaps states this most succinctly: “True manhood was courage.” In 1791 Kentuckians acknowledged this relationship when militiamen headed north to confront marauding Indians. A Lexington Kentucky Gazette writer assured his readers that “there is not the smallest shadow of doubt, but they will return crowned with laurels, as the men are not only in high spirits, but generally known to be brave.” Yet courage did not necessarily ensure victory. After the defeat and massacre of Kentucky troops at the River Raisin in 1813, the Kentucky Gazette recorded that the men displayed “a daring intrepidity and courageous ardor when encountering the enemy, which reflects the highest honor on their character.” A measure of redemption and revenge for the Raisin disaster came a few months later at the Battle of the Thames, where Col. Richard M. Johnson, leading his Kentucky volunteers against Tecumseh’s warriors, reestablished Kentucky’s collective courage with “a manly and desper-

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ate effort to break the lines of the Indians.” Indeed, according to the Kentucky Gazette, the Kentuckians’ courage all but guaranteed victory. Johnson’s “manly effort” underscores the symbiotic relationship that existed between the militia experience and those qualities of character that defined manhood. Discipline, duty, patriotism, honor, chivalry, and courage identified both the exemplary soldier and the ideal man. The second element of the militia’s masculine culture was a shared white male identity and community. A rigid social structure based not on birth but on race, class, and gender characterized American society from the early seventeenth century. By the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, rich and poor men had bridged their differences to create a unified community, a democracy of white males. Widespread militia participation sustained this alliance of race and gender, with every white male enjoying the opportunity to join the local company of citizen-soldiers. The obvious message of militia events such as Independence Day and Washington’s Birthday was freedom and liberty, but the subtext, written by and for white males, reinforced the citizen-soldiers’ self-identity, unity, and homogeneity. Companies mixed men from different walks of life whose disparate economic and social positions normally defined separate worlds. Joining together as militiamen bridged these differences, creating a single, shared world, even if only for a few hours. In 1834, Shelbyville Capt. James Allen organized a company of men who were relatively poor. He covered the cost of uniforms himself, going two hundred dollars in debt to purchase caps, feathers, and other paraphernalia. Allen’s willingness to underwrite the expense suggests more than a desire for military glory. His actions affirmed his elevated social position, supported the participants’ commitment to each other, diminished potential interclass resentment, and constrained overt expressions of disaffection. For the men in Allen’s company and for citizensoldiers everywhere, the militia demonstrated their unity as Americans and their membership in the exclusive fraternity of white males. Such displays, however, concealed social distinctions beneath a façade of unity. A military structure based on rank preserved the social order without threatening the unity among white men. In the enrolled militia, poor whites marched in parades commanded by officers who were their social and economic betters, thus maintaining society’s organic structure. Gifted orators and military men commanded respect and [ 110 ]

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admiration, especially in the South, which allowed them to maintain control over celebrations and rituals. These events strengthened their grip on social and political power through speeches, songs, toasts, food, and drink. The common sort who filled the ranks at holiday celebrations listened silently, notwithstanding the occasional cheer for the United States, George Washington, or the “American Fair.” Not surprisingly, the poor never found themselves initiating these holiday rituals; only the better sort enjoyed this privilege. Yet despite these socioeconomic divisions, differences among militiamen remained subordinate to the fraternalism of the white male community. Most males appeared willing to accept the social and economic pecking order of the militia companies for confirmation of their superior status in the exclusive democracy of white manhood. In the later volunteer units, the sense of a shared, democratic experience was even more pronounced because of greater social equality among members. The third element of the masculine militia ethos was the exclusion of all but white males, exemplified in the practice of closing the doors to women and blacks during the after-dinner toasting rituals. While ostensibly an act of white male inclusion, the underlying force in this case is exclusion. Sociologists and social historians have demonstrated that an individual creates an identity in opposition to an “other.” The identification of those who are different defines the traits and mannerisms that, innate or otherwise, one does not possess. In the nineteenth century, being a man meant in part not being a woman or a child—in other words, not being effeminate or immature. Most damning was the unmanly fault of dependency. The dependent of society lacked the ability to care for themselves, and nineteenth-century society branded women, African Americans, and children as thus deficient, relegating them to the margins of the public sphere. Women rarely found themselves directly involved in militia events. At best they participated as spectators, attending parades and listening to speeches. Toast making remained an all-male practice. Women excused themselves before the rounds began, and the universal acknowledgment to the “American Fair” and the observation of women’s need for protection emphasized their dependent, subordinate status. Women’s attendance at parades, musters, and barbecues enlivened social intercourse and contributed to the perception of social harmony, but more subtly, their presence gave tacit approval to the gendered subtext: white [ 111 ]

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male hegemony. Had women refused to play this subordinate role they might have threatened male dominance, but their willing participation in the day’s events and their acquiescence to all-male rituals confirmed rather than challenged such practices. Women were women; militiamen were men—an arrangement reiterated by the sights, sounds, and participants of every militia gathering. African Americans occupied an even more obscure position. Their “peculiar” status as slaves figuratively and often literally excluded them from the white community, including militia service. Colonial law had excluded blacks from militia companies, a practice carried over into most state legislation. Section I of the Federal Militia Act of 1792 stipulated that “each and every free able-bodied white male citizen . . . shall severally and respectively be enrolled in the militia.” Kentucky’s first legislative session after gaining statehood passed a law that required “all free male persons . . . be enrolled and formed into companies agreeable to the laws of congress.” Such would be the wording of the enrolled militia laws into the nineteenth century. Although the qualifier “white” does not appear in the state’s law, prevailing attitudes and social practices likely made it impossible for black participation in the militia. Laws authorizing militia patrols into “all negro quarters, and other places suspected of entertaining unlawful assemblies of Slaves, Servants or other disorderly persons,” strongly indicate that few if any African Americans would have appeared in militia ranks. The likelihood of finding black militiamen was even less later in the nineteenth century, when volunteer units had replaced enrolled companies. Beginning in the 1830s, as a consequence of growing abolitionist rhetoric and southern reaction, racial awareness became more pronounced. There was little chance elite volunteer militiamen would open their ranks to a free black man, regardless of his wealth, education, or social sophistication. For African Americans then, like women, the relationship with the militia remained limited to providing visual confirmation of the “other” and thus sustaining society’s hierarchical order, especially the privileged position of white militiamen. In addition to women and African Americans, boys and unruly adult males defined what men were not. A boy was a child, irresponsible, undisciplined, and dependent, the opposite of a mature and sober man who displayed self-control, a sense of duty, and honor. Lumped into the

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same category were single adult males, who although no longer boys, had yet to assume the responsibilities and characteristics of manhood. Bachelors symbolized the ranks of the unruly—no family, no dependents to govern, no responsibility, and thus no manhood. Like their younger counterparts, they were seen as deficient in self-restraint, discipline, and independence. Responsible society worked to cajole, convince, and even embarrass these potential troublemakers into embracing the socially defined markers of masculinity. Marriage and family, however, was not the only path to manhood. Mark Kann notes that the “stigma of bachelorhood” could be conquered by “the doing of manly deeds,” deeds like militia service, through which a disorderly individual, lacking the maturity granted through governing a home, could earn the reputation of being disciplined, restrained, and honorable—of being a man. Exclusive fraternal organizations operated in a manner similar to militia companies, writes Dana Nelson. They served as a “space of formal masculine affiliation that would allow [men] to leave outside all that threatened.” This fraternal atmosphere encouraged a bonding among men who mustered diverse social and economic experiences. The men’s differences, however, were insufficient to cast any citizen-soldier down among the others of society. The militia’s rank-based organization did not confer absolute equality; instead it produced what might be called a hierarchical brotherhood. The fourth element of the militia’s culture of manhood, and perhaps the most apparent one, was the martial ornaments of weapons and uniforms. Swords, pistols, muskets, and an occasional cannon enhanced the sights and sounds of militia celebrations, but more importantly, weapons symbolically confirmed the militia’s responsibilities as the nation’s first defenders and dramatized the relationship between guns and manliness. Fear of foreign invaders, civil insurrections, and slave revolts in the South demanded that men achieve and retain a degree of proficiency with powder and ball. Historian John Hope Franklin notes that handling a gun was part and parcel of growing up and becoming a man, confirming Daniel R. Hundley’s 1860 description of the “yeoman” as one who “always possess[ed] a manly independence of character.” Hundley continued, “He marches right on to where duty and honor call, and with unblanched cheek meets death face to face,” carrying only “the deadly rifle . . . and this he handles with such skill as few possess.” Such

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observations gave credence to the popular perception that southerners were all Daniel Boones, men who learned to handle a gun in the cradle and who could peg a squirrel at a hundred paces. As a consequence of the Revolution and the War of 1812, faith in the citizen-soldiers’ ability to use a gun became part of the national mythology. During the Revolution, Americans credited the militia with going toe-to-toe against British regulars and holding their own, despite enduring more losses than victories. By the war’s end, Washington’s Continental Army received little credit because Americans ignored the Regular Army’s contribution to victory, while heaping praise on the supposed innate martial skills of family and friends who fought in the militia. The performance of the next generation of citizen-soldiers in the War of 1812 was not unlike that of the Revolution. Despite the rare but wellpublicized successes at Baltimore and New Orleans, the militia suffered at the hands of British regulars. During the war, officers reminded their men that success or failure often turned on an army’s attention to its weapons. “It is [in] vein that you are brave and cautious [and] submit to the hardships of a campaign if you resist the enemy with your arms in sad order,” lectured Gen. James Winchester to his troops at Camp Defiance in 1812. “Not only the life of the brave man but the salvation of the army may depend on the salvation of their arms.” Winchester’s admonition, like those of other officers, could do little to alleviate the shortage of weapons or the shortage of skills necessary for their effective use. Kentucky’s political leaders warned Congress that the state faced a weapons crisis, a deficiency shared by most states in the Union and one that adversely affected the ability to train in the manual of arms and effectiveness in combat. Even the famed “Hunters of Kentucky,” glorified in story and song for their victorious effort at New Orleans, in truth fired only a few shots from behind barricades while artillery decimated the poorly led British troops. The legend of the Hunters of Kentucky, notes historian John William Ward, arose from Americans’ wishful myth making. Fact or fiction, the accepted memory of the militia at New Orleans reinforced the popular image of citizen-soldiers: men ready to defend loved ones and liberty with a stout heart, a steady rifle, and manly courage. In the 1830s and 1840s, Texas independence and the Mexican War presented a chance for another generation to shoulder arms and demonstrate its manliness, this time in volunteer companies. Suffering from [ 114 ]

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Texas fever, young men throughout Kentucky and across the nation formed independent, volunteer militia units whose very existence depended on a government supply of arms. In 1832, hoping to secure weapons for a Louisville regiment, George W. Chambers wrote to the quartermaster general that the men “seem to display considerable Military spirit and . . . no doubt will take special care of the arms.” Five years later Capt. John Brown sought similar support: “We are anxious to obtain [arms] before the river closes. Should we fail in getting them I am fearful the company will fail.” A Shelbyville officer who had incurred a substantial debt to help uniform his company feared for his investment if weapons failed to arrive soon. “There is considerable dissatisfaction,” he worried in 1834, “on account of not receiving the arms and if we do not receive the arms by the fall muster I am afraid the company will break up and leave me in the lurch.” Although few if any of the men in these units owned weapons, firearms were the ingredient that legitimated their existence as a military organization and their masculine image. Ostensibly, a desire for sufficient firepower motivated these demands for weapons, but closer examination shows that concern for public appearances often outweighed military preparedness. As early as 1705, Robert Beverly revealed in his History and Present State of Virginia that the militia used their weapons for ceremonial purposes, “to fire upon some Joyful Occasions,” a tradition that continued into the nineteenth century. In 1840 a Louisville commander recorded that his men had suffered for months without arms and would be “sadly disappointed if again deferred” in their request for rifles: “We have a parade in a few days and shall need arms” (emphasis added). Col. E. G. House, also of Louisville, informed Kentucky’s adjutant general that his company was “rapidly progressing in the uniforming which is after the style of the United States officers” but that guns were necessary to allow them to “parade as a company.” And in 1848 a Bath County company notified Adjutant General Dudley that “we are all ready for a parade. We want 50 stack of Musket with coloured barrels.” The men who formed the Elkton Blues in 1844 confessed their deficiencies in military matters but nevertheless petitioned the governor for a stand of arms. B. H. Reeves explained to Governor Letcher that “we do not profess to be military men nor to know what are the requirements of the laws in relation to the public arms. If your Excellency deems it [ 115 ]

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proper to distribute arms . . . the young men of our town and vicinity would be gratified in obtaining them at as early a period as practicable.” Some companies, aspiring beyond a few muskets or rifles, desired the notoriety and prestige associated with artillery. Captain Harris asked the quartermaster general to inform him “whether a small cannon (mounted) could be had at Frankfort.” In Mount Sterling the members of the Montgomery Artillery Company responded with “the liveliest demonstrations” upon learning that Governor Owsley had issued their unit a cannon, thereby granting a degree of legitimacy to their company name. Weapons added to the pageantry of a parade and boosted members’ morale, promoting “a proper military spirit (a thing much to be desired),” according to a group of Lexington volunteers in 1841. In their request for arms in 1852, men from Russellville, Kentucky, confessed, “We have again the Military fever. We have formed an Infantry Company which we are vain enough to hope will do credit to our town and country.” Gaining weapons improved morale, but their removal proved the quickest cure for a military fever. William Bradford discovered as much in 1842 when the adjutant general threatened to recall his company’s muskets: “If our arms were reduced there would be a corresponding reduction in the Military pride of our company, which perhaps might tend to its demolition.” Bradford had voiced the concern of citizen-soldiers across the nation: guns were his company’s lifeblood—removing their weapons eliminated the legitimacy of their existence as a military and masculine organization. Despite the ardent appeals for muskets, rifles, and artillery, the adjutant general’s office fought an unrelenting battle against disrepair and poor maintenance once citizen-soldiers took possession of arms. This was another troublesome militia tradition dating to the colonial era, when British officers complained of American indifference to weapons upkeep. American officers voiced similar complaints during the Revolution, the War of 1812, and succeeding years. In Kentucky the direct distribution of muskets to individuals in 1826 created a situation that almost guaranteed neglect and abuse, as guns became “scattered over the State in every direction, many of them destroyed, many become injured and useless without having the slightest service.” Little changed in the 1830s as volunteer units organized and then disbanded, returning weapons to the government in a degraded if not unusable condition. [ 116 ]

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“The muskets are scattered about and kept in no arsenal but are in private hands, badly treated,” one officer observed in 1837. This prompted captains and commanders who requested arms to give assurances that their men would see to the weapons’ care and maintenance. “If the Government will furnish the Harrison troop with a new stand,” Brig. Maj. Henry Leuba pledged to his superior in 1835, “they’ll be kept in the best order, and that troop will be an ornament to the [Kentucky militia].” Five years later William M. Samuel of Paris went even further to satisfy the quartermaster general that “the young and responsible men of our little town” would take proper care of the requested weapons. “We are aware Sir that arms formerly sent here have not been strictly attended to, but a different Spirit is now amongst us. . . . I have no doubt that the most strict and pertinacious attention will be paid to care for the arms, a good room has been procured . . . and a Committee appointed to [care for] them.” Kentucky’s military fever ran high in the 1840s, as war with Mexico approached and militia companies overwhelmed state officials with requests for government-issue weapons. Responding to the demand, the state began to recall arms from units that appeared inactive, initiating competition and resentment among companies. In 1840 Jesse Stevens of Princeton responded to a request for the return of state weapons by arguing that “the citizens would be very unwilling to give [up their guns] as they have a large company and made extensive arrangements for equipping them.” A rumor in 1845 that the quartermaster general was about to recall his artillery company’s cannon prodded Capt. S. D. McCullough of Lexington to act. Hoping to head off the order, McCullough warned that “if the gun should now be taken from us, or even a fear that such will be the case, it will have the effect to dishearten the men and may soon to disband the company.” Two weeks later, quartermaster Ambrose Dudley acceded to the captain’s request to keep the cannon, but with this caveat: “You can retain it until it is required for another portion of the state and no longer.” Captain Marshall of the Louisville Guards took great offense when the state recalled a portion of his company’s muskets: “Your requisition for the return of [the muskets] will break up the handsomest company in Kentucky. . . . I do not know why or how the Dutch Company of this place holds seventy muskets when the Guards are required to be limited to forty! . . . I cannot fancy why the arms should be returned to rust in an arsenal when in the armory of the [ 117 ]

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Guards they are preserved in first rate order, kept bright and clean and always inspected once a week.” As the emotion of McCullough and Marshall suggest, once companies secured weapons, they were disinclined to surrender them. Weapons took on such significance that the battles between militia companies to obtain and keep them turned malicious and personal. False rumors of his company’s imminent dissolution prompted Capt. William Bradford to defend the honor of his artillery unit. In an 1845 letter to Quartermaster Dudley, Bradford proclaimed, “I deemed it my duty to correct any erroneous impressions knowing that [accusations] have been made by those who desire the overthrow of the Volunteer company, which has at all times been without a successful competition in acquiring a knowledge of Military tactics.” He assured Dudley that his unit had no intention of disbanding, blaming a “Counter Encampment” for rumors to the contrary: “We care not for the machinations of those who are disposed to crush us, but we do object to have false impressions made upon your mind, by our enemies.” Bradford remained confident that the general would not withdraw the “pride of our Corps,” a trust that appears well-placed as he received no demand to surrender the cannon. General Dudley normally operated as the moderator for these disputes over muskets and cannon, but in 1851 he found himself in the middle of a tug of war between a Lexington artillery company and Capt. Thomas Coons’s Jessamine County militiamen. Coons’s unit expected to take charge of a cannon held by the Lexington company, so he called on “Mr. Winchester, one of the men who has the gun in his possession.” Winchester admitted that his company had disbanded, but he was nevertheless unwilling to part with the artillery piece. Winchester was, according to Coons, less than cooperative, swearing that “he and others there would see you [Gen. Dudley] and our company at the devil before we should have it, and that you was a d—d old fool and had no right to demand it.” Dudley’s response unfortunately went unrecorded; nevertheless, militiamen’s fighting and fretting over acquisition and control of weapons demonstrates that military preparedness was at times secondary to concern for public appearances. The demand for weapons and disputes over their control reveal the significance of the weaponry to the life of militia companies and to the public persona militiamen hoped to create. In the most practical sense, [ 118 ]

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guns were necessary to the militia’s traditional responsibility as the community’s defenders; citizen-soldiers without weapons were hardly soldiers. Weapons, however, had a purpose beyond the obvious, as the comments of company commanders attest. They were an essential part of the pageantry and popular image the militia created in their parades and ceremonies. Gunfire and thunderous cannonades drowned out the tedium of daily life. Conversely, drilling with cornstalks and brooms did little to raise recruits, crowds, or confidence. Nor were such ersatz weapons appropriate for the Fourth of July or Washington’s Birthday. Lexington militiamen revealed as much in 1841 when they assured the quartermaster general of their willingness, “if there should not be pistols sufficient in the arsenal, as they are not absolutely necessary for common parade, . . . to take swords & holsters.” Guns were preferred, swords would do, but some kind of weapon was necessary to make soldiers out of citizens. Attention to uniforms among the later volunteer militia reveals the same subordination of martial fitness to public appearance and the association of the martial and the masculine. At military schools, concern over uniforms often superseded attention to academics, and in holiday parades, uniforms set citizen-soldiers apart, further underscoring their special status among neighbors. In 1835 Captain Tarlton of Louisville proudly announced that “the company I have raised have uniformed themselves splendidly which cost them at least $100 each.” Richmond Capt. John Miller informed the quartermaster that “the young men of our town have arranged a very handsome company and gone to considerable expense in uniforming, etc.” Captain Bradford of the Lexington Artillery Company was pleased with the efforts of his troops, “all of whom are gradually equipping with an entire full and dress uniform, as this is somewhat expensive, we are compelled to progress by degrees—but a better spirit I never saw manifested.” Uniforms did not, however, always produce a better spirit. One company in eastern Estill County became so divided over changing their uniforms that the captain thought “it very probable that the old company will be dissolved.” In addition, the expense of uniforms could become a considerable burden, as Shelbyville Capt. James Allen found in 1834. Writing to the quartermaster concerning a previous request for weapons, Allen apologized for his directness: “You may think I am [imprudent], but the circumstance in which I am placed forces me to be so. I have gone one or two hundred dollars in debt for caps, [ 119 ]

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plumes, etc. on the faith of receiving public arms and the company going into operation.” Allen’s desire for extravagant uniforms had outpaced his financial resources, and should the arms not arrive in time, he feared his men would leave him holding the uniforms as well as the bill. Mary Ann Clawson, in her sociological study of nineteenth-century fraternal organizations, found a similar obsession with military uniforms when members turned out for public events adorned in all manner of colors, ribbons, feathers, and ornaments. This visual festival induced admiration if not envy among other males, who could not fail to notice the attention paid to well-dressed citizen-soldiers. Edmund Cooper, for example, who in 1836 joined the White Oak Sprouts, a politically oriented youth militia company in Columbia, Tennessee, found the unit’s extravagant uniforms far more appealing than political campaigns or debates. Beyond the showmanship, military trappings were also great discriminators. Consumer goods, including uniforms and weapons, conveyed messages of exclusivity, power, and hierarchical order. At militia events, especially those of volunteer units, the vivid display of colorful uniforms marked the “otherness” of those who could only watch. Moreover, expensive uniforms and weapons further emphasized the economic disparities within the white male fraternity. Few could afford such opulence, and those who could not found themselves relegated to the company’s lesser ranks or the role of spectator, joining the anonymous crowds of women, children, and slaves. Uniforms and weapons thus enhanced citizen-soldiers’ manly image with visual evidence that confirmed both their elevated status and their ostensible willingness to risk life and limb in the community’s defense. Should the British be inclined to try their luck yet again, the parading militia at least appeared well-prepared. At the end of the muster day, an impressive appearance mattered most. Recall B. H. Reeves’s 1844 confession that he and his company did not “profess to be military men nor to know what are the requirements of the law in relation to the public arms. . . . [Nevertheless,] the young men of our town and vicinity would be gratified in obtaining [guns] at as early a period as practicable.” For this company, looking like soldiers was more important than being soldiers. In 1841 Brig. Gen. W. S. Pilcher heaped praise upon his men for “the splendid and ample preparations

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they have made, their full band of Martial Music, their equipage, their Military air.” Nothing, however, was worthy of note concerning their proficiency with weapons or their military preparedness. Governor Gabriel Slaughter, in his annual message to the Kentucky legislature in 1816, summed up the nexus among arms, a martial spirit, and manliness: “Arms produce discipline, inspire a spirit of manly independence, give the people confidence in their strength, and prepare them for resistance to oppression.” Whether the governor’s observation identified the reality of the militia’s confidence and skill or was simply one politician’s platitudes, his words reveal the powerful symbolic role of weapons and uniforms in defining a masculine military culture. A martial appearance was for all intents and purposes a manly appearance. The final factor in the creation of a militia culture was a military education. Theoretically, martial instruction imparted the appropriate characteristics of self-discipline, honor, and courage as well as the physical training necessary to become an able soldier and a manly individual. Boys had received training in the military arts since the time of the ancients. Xenophon wrote of the Persians who spent years training their youth “to guard the community and to practice self-restraint.” Centuries later, his observations found new life in the pens of Machiavelli and John Milton. Machiavelli advised modern republics that military training would ensure a fit class of men, and Milton’s 1644 essay “On Education” argued that teaching boys martial skills was “the likeliest meanes to make them grow large, and tall, and to inspire them with a gallant and fearlesse courage.” Such resolute bravery, “being temper’d with seasonable lectures and precepts . . . of true fortitude, and patience, will turn into a native and heroick valour, and make them hate cowardise of doing wrong.” Europeans brought their faith in the benefits of martial qualities to the American wilderness, and after the Revolution the young nation looked to these old lessons to produce men. In a 1793 sermon to the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company of Boston, Peter Thacher proposed, “Our young men should be early instructed in the art of war, and every one should hold himself in readiness to ‘play the man for his people, and the cities of his God.’” Thomas Jefferson, who oversaw the creation of the United States Military Academy at West Point, advocated military training at his “other school,” the University of Virginia. And in

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1863 Ralph Waldo Emerson advised “the youth to be an armed and complete man. . . . These are the first steps to power.” These proponents advocated a martial education, which is related to but distinct from military training. Their objective was not to create and train a European-style professional military force; rather, they promoted the lessons of discipline, honor, courage, and self-responsibility that a military-oriented education provided the nation’s young men. The founding generation expected their sons to learn these lessons of manhood through martial skills and thereby to develop a manly bearing. Across the nation in the early years of the nineteenth century, as veterans, soldiers, and politicians extolled the virtues of martial education, military institutions gained popularity. Capt. Alden Partridge, a graduate and former superintendent of West Point, was the greatest proponent of military training. Founder of the American Literary, Scientific, and Military Academy of Norwich, Vermont, he put pen to paper in 1825 and outlined the advantages and benefits of a military education. Partridge’s tenets on the instruction of young males demonstrate the close association Americans saw between a military culture and manliness, especially how a martial education encouraged masculine ideals. In his “Arguments for Military Education,” the former West Pointer first made clear that “every American citizen, from eighteen to forty-five . . . is emphatically a citizen soldier,” and each must be “prepared by education to discharge, correctly, his duties.” To achieve this goal, Partridge argued that the “militia must be patronized and improved, and military information must be disseminated amongst the great mass of the people.” Military schools and academies offered the most efficient path to this end, laying the foundation for a sound republic. The national and individual benefits of such institutions were nearly infinite. “A scientific knowledge” of the military arts allowed one to read history intelligently, “both ancient and modern,” and was of “great importance” to historical writing. A military education was “essentially necessary for the Legislature” as well as of “great use to the traveller.” In addition, a man lucky enough to attend an academy emerged “with habits of industry, economy and morality, and, what is of little less importance, a firm and vigorous constitution.” Physical training, a requirement of Partridge’s curriculum, produced a student of “good figure and manliness of deportment.” The Partridge program stood rigidly on the principle that a military education marched and disciplined boys into men: “Whenever a [ 122 ]

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youth can be impressed with the true principles and feelings of a soldier, he becomes, as a matter of course, subordinate, honorable, manly.” Kentuckians first enjoyed the benefits of an honorable and manly education in March 1809, when Joseph Ellerback placed an advertisement in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette addressed to the “Officers, Commissioned & Non-Commissioned, of Militia and Volunteers of Kentucky.” Claiming extensive military experience, but too advanced in age for active service, Ellerback offered for a fee to instruct military-minded men in the arts of “maneuvering” and “use of arms” and, perhaps more importantly, how to cultivate discipline, that timeless marker of manhood. “The state of affairs calls aloud for our strictest attention to this science,” he wrote, expressing a desire to “see the country in a better state of discipline.” And he, of course, could teach “all high spirited young men” to “learn their discipline.” Less than a month later, competition arrived in the Lexington military education market, when John R. Shaw, a self-proclaimed “drill master,” offered “his services to the youth, as a teacher of the military evolutions.” Shaw targeted Lexington’s twelve- to sixteen-year-old boys as potential students and appealed to their sense of duty. The drillmaster’s sincerity is suspect, however, since his curriculum emphasized more pageantry than patriotism. The youthful soldiers would learn “all the different modes of marching, wheeling, forming, and firing,” but Shaw emphasized a “uniform . . . of a round-a-bout coat, with red cuffs and cape, with vests and pantaloons . . . dyed a blue colour, with round hats and black cockades and feathers, ruffled shirts with black stocks or handkerchiefs, with light arms and accouterments.” We can only speculate whose curriculum was more popular among teenage boys, Shaw’s “ruffled shirts” with “red cuffs and cape” or Ellerback’s “better state of discipline.” Regardless, both illustrate a military education’s contribution to a manly persona. Ellerback drew upon the desire to develop traditional masculine self-control and discipline, while Shaw played on the symbolism of uniforms and weapons. Both presented an opportunity to acquire the attributes of masculinity through a martial education. Ellerback and Shaw took advantage of the increasing tension in 1809 among the United States, France, and Great Britain over trade policies (especially Jefferson’s embargo) to promote the benefits of acquiring martial skills. The War of 1812 increased both national anxieties and the opportunities for enterprising drillmasters. In July 1814 Maj. R. I. Dunn, [ 123 ]

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the “late Principal of the Philadelphia Military Academy,” solicited the men of Lexington to refine their martial skills, on foot or horse, under his tutelage. His curriculum appears far more practical than those of his predecessors, emphasizing attacks, defensive skills, and swordsmanship for both infantry and cavalry. Uniforms, if part of Major Dunn’s regimen, remained secondary. A month later he offered specialized instruction in “the most useful branch of self defense with Infantry Sword, Cut and Thrust.” The sword in the early republic remained popular as both a weapon and a “symbol of manly honor.” For the next two months, students apparently kept the major busy, and in mid-October an advertisement announced that he would begin night classes as soon as a sufficient number of students applied. Dunn ran the advertisement for the next four weeks, and on November 14, 1814, he notified residents that “as his present engagement [had been] fulfilled,” he planned to move to Frankfort, thanking the “gentlemen” who had “honored him with their patronage.” The major returned to the Lexington area the following year and again in 1830, 1833, and 1840, and then in 1842 he published his “Military Pocket Manuel.” He passed away a few years later, succumbing to the inglorious malady of chronic diarrhea. Major Dunn’s long career on the parade ground, teaching would-be soldiers the “cut and thrust,” inspired other entrepreneurial military minds. In September 1816 a Major Chevis advertised that his military school was open and accepting new students of the military arts. Another optimistic trooper apparently believed specialization held the key to success in military pedagogy, and in 1816 he opened a “military music school.” “The want of military music,” he informed his prospective trainees, “is so much felt by every one who knows the effect of the ‘soul stirring drum and piercing fife,’ on the heart of every soldier, that nothing else will be wanting to stimulate fathers to send their sons to learn this art.” No record exists of how many fathers and sons felt so stirred. Parents, according to sociologist Joe L. Dubbert, “were often sold on the wisdom of choosing a military-school education for their sons because of the perfect discipline taught in the academies.” In 1845, West Point graduate and Seminole War veteran Gen. R. T. P. Allen set out to address this need and created Kentucky’s first military institution, the Kentucky Military Institute. Located near Frankfort and chartered by

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the state in 1847, the school contributed officers to North and South in the Civil War and was in operation as late as 1870. Sharing General Allen’s belief in the benefits of a military education, students at Georgetown College formed a volunteer company of cadets in 1835 “for the purpose of learning the Military Tactics, as taught at West Point.” This company may have been the genesis of the Western Military Institute, which began accepting students in 1846. The faculty hoped to improve not only the martial skills of their charges but their “intellectual, moral and personal” qualities as well. The Institute survived until at least 1849 when it announced plans to relocate to the Lower Blue Licks in northeastern Kentucky. Forgoing such institutional instruction, a few ambitious young men formed their own militia companies, organizations that according to historian Lisa Tobert were “an important part of their training to assume adult male roles.” In 1840 a group of boys in Paris, Kentucky, demonstrated the initiative to organize such a company. “I have been requested,” Will M. Garrard wrote to the state’s adjutant general, “to write to you by the young men of Paris to respectfully ask you to lend your aid to them in the procurement of a stand of arms for their Infantry company styled the ‘Bourbon Greys.’ The company is composed of the most . . . [illegible] young men of the town, and the spirit enlisted is a firm and determined one.” John W. Finnell found the same determination among the youth of Lexington: “The young gentlemen of this city have within a few days past formed a military company styled the ‘Harrison Cadets’ have uniformed themselves and have elected their officers. Many of them are under the age at which the law requires them to perform military duty but partaking of the spirit of emulation which seems at this time to pervade the whole west have taken this step to improve themselves in military tactics.” Self-taught boys, itinerant drillmasters, or formal military institutions—all supplied a martial education that sustained the relationship between the military and masculinity. Instructors guaranteed that their successful protégés would become proficient in swordsmanship and the manual of arms, and cultivate the honor, courage, and self-discipline of a soldier and a man. In the nation’s evolving social and economic climate and the corresponding transformation of masculine ideals, young men sought an environment that would inculcate uncontested manhood. A

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military education not only taught the cut and thrust; it perfected “honorable, manly” men. Men form their self-identities in part by mimicking male role models. In the early nineteenth century, accepted symbols of manhood had fallen into doubt and disarray. The dislocations initiated by the market revolution created new challenges for American men as they worked to adapt to a changing economic, political, and social environment. The time-honored values of sacrifice, duty, and community surrendered to acquisitiveness, individualism, and self-interest. More than an economic transformation was under way; indeed, the very meaning of manhood had become ambiguous. In this uncertain environment, the militia offered a safe harbor of manhood. Militia service reinforced eighteenth-century masculine ideals of the communal man by creating a fraternal environment that encouraged a commitment to the common good, self-sacrifice, and protection of family and community. Mary Ann Clawson, in her study of male groups in the early republic, demonstrates that “fraternalism recognized that capitalist development involved an attack upon a historically specific version of masculine identity. . . . Much of the fraternal order’s appeal was located in its defense of this identity.” In a similar fashion, the militia’s emphasis on traditional qualities and symbols of manhood resonated among the male population. R. Claire Snyder has shown that “the Citizen-Soldier constituted a cultural and political ideal that was more important for the production of masculine citizens than for actual military effectiveness.” This masculine-military relationship existed because “the same practices constitutive of citizen-soldiers also construct masculinity.” United by race and gender in an organization historically associated with manliness, militia companies offered a refuge of traditional manhood. By joining together as citizen-soldiers, men created an environment protected from the questions, doubts, and misgivings raised by the market economy’s self-made man. The familiar manhood that males found in the fraternalism of militia companies was a corporate masculine identity—that is, the individual grounded his claim to manhood on participation in an institution whose culture of martial characteristics, exclusivity, weapons, uniforms, and military education sustained a historical, uncontested manhood. “The

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American males,” Mark Kann writes, “who participated in martial rhetoric, militia service, volunteer companies, the regular army, and combat simultaneously laid claim to . . . manhood.” The militia’s institutional practices and its associated martial culture did indeed confer a masculine identity on participants, but the citizen-soldiers’ responsibilities as the nation’s first line of defense presented a greater and more absolute opportunity to demonstrate a manly character, an opportunity that came in battle.

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“We have completed a company of dragoons,” Capt. W. T. Ward of Greenburg wrote to Governor William Owsley in 1846, “numbering eighty four brave stout and chivalrous souls as brave as ever buckled on a sword or mounted a steed. . . . If ever human beings panted to face the enemy of our common country our cavalry and Capt Maxey[’s] Green river boys are those souls. . . . Maxey[’s] company is also complete and all eager for the fray.” As fate would have it, despite their enthusiasm, the commands of Captains Ward and Maxey never had the chance to join the fight. Their offer to “march to the Rio Grande, . . . the scene of action,” arrived on the governor’s desk too late; other units had already filled Kentucky’s quota for volunteers to fight in the 1846 campaign in Mexico. Despite the inherent dangers of marching off to war in a foreign land, citizensoldiers responded in droves to the government’s call for volunteers. In substance, the response of these militiamen differed little from the reaction of earlier nineteenth-century citizen-soldiers. When the opportunity arose to participate in combat, Kentuckians demonstrated an eagerness to join in the fight. Their enthusiasm, however, seemingly ran counter to common sense, self-preservation, and the well-being of their families, as the possibility of serious injury or death from bullet or disease accompanied every campaign. Nevertheless, the state’s citizensoldiers time and again made clear that they were “eager for the fray.” The explanation for their apparent imprudence in part lies in the role that battle experience has played in the construction of masculinity. Peoples across time and cultures have associated combat and the masculine. Western civilization, from the ancient Romans to the American Revolutionaries, accepted participation in armed conflict as proof of manliness. Sociologist Joe L. Dubbert identifies “moral honor and the physical stamina to see the battle through [as] the crucial attributes any [ 128 ]

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manly American male was supposed to possess. . . . Throughout history, war had been seen as a test of endurance and courage, or, as some might put it today, the ultimate evidence of ‘guts.’”  In eighteenth-century Europe, however, only those privileged enough to hold social and military rank enjoyed the benefits of proving their mettle on the battlefield. Conversely, those who served and died at the bottom of the chain of command came from the bottom of society’s “great chain of being.” They were considered the dregs, the expendable, the refuse of European communities. The rank and file won no glory or fame in the clash of armies; their payoff was a meager salary and similar rations. European society showed little interest in these men’s lives, let alone their manhood. In America, the necessities of colonial life immediately established a more egalitarian society that rejected the hereditary mandates of Europe. The militia’s involvement in the American Revolution demonstrated that access to manhood through military participation had been democratized. Armed with republican ideals, now the ordinary farmer or artisan could prove his masculinity by temporarily taking up his musket in defense of family, friends, and country. They joined their social betters not only in sharing the risks of battle but also in gathering the rewards of honor, respect, and manhood. The American militiaman had democratized martial masculinity. Later, as the nineteenth century’s market economy tried to sell a new model of manhood, marching off to war continued to give men the opportunity to prove their masculinity by the universally acknowledged, time-tested, absolute trial of combat. Arthur Moore demonstrates in his study of Kentucky’s frontier culture that “warfare . . . tak[es] the measure of men according to fixed values. . . . [It] separates the able from the unfit.” The concepts of man and soldier were intimately bound to one another, and in time of war, to remain a civilian was to risk being thought unmanly, while joining the fight was proof of manhood. Moreover, men were made in the public arena, not the private psyche. A man had to give public evidence of his masculinity and live up to the community’s standards of manhood, and for most, the chance to measure up came in the militia. Battle established a militiaman’s masculinity in three ways. First and foremost, nineteenth-century Americans continued the traditional association of manly qualities with those who bore arms—to fight was [ 129 ]

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to be a man. Marching off to war was proof of the strength, honor, and courage that Western cultures associated with manliness. Battle allowed individuals to distinguish themselves from the anonymous and ordinary; it was an opportunity to become extraordinary. Second, the militiaman’s willingness to defend his family, country, and honor reaffirmed a core characteristic of the communal man and civic republicanism: defense of home. Although self-interest and the egotism of the self-made man were consuming the ideals of self-sacrifice and concern for the commonweal, defending home and country continued as a defining feature of manhood. And third, only in battle could the sons of heroes test themselves against the virtuous and manly legacy of their forefathers. Comparisons to preceding generations of Americans—the fathers and grandfathers who through manly virtue won independence in the Revolution and then secured that victory in the War of 1812— exacerbated the confusion and self-doubt created by evolving norms of masculinity. Was the current generation as virtuous? Could it measure up to the Revolutionaries of ’76 or sustain the reputation of the Hunters of Kentucky of 1815? Only through an equivalent test of courage and fortitude could they prove themselves equal to the legacy of Washington, Harrison, and Jackson. As the definition of masculinity evolved, militiamen found in battle a stable and secure—and admittedly dangerous—refuge of manhood. What was the proper role for a man in American society: Head of a household or head of a factory? Virtuous citizen or scheming confidence man? Self-sacrifice or self-interest? More than any preceding generation, men of the early nineteenth century, because of the democratizing nature of the militia, could demonstrate their manhood without regard to such questions. Through tradition and consensus, the soldier established his legitimacy as a man. The near desperation of Captain Ward’s and Captain Maxey’s men to join the Mexican War shows the intimacy that existed between combat and masculinity, a relationship Americans had acknowledged for generations. In 1777 John Adams expressed his belief in the manly benefits of a military experience for his sons: “I would send every one of them into the army in some capacity or other. Military abilities and experience are a great advantage to character.” The thoughts of this New England aristocrat writing in the midst of the Revolution resonated among [ 130 ]

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Kentucky militiamen fighting Indians in the 1790s. Prospective militia volunteers read in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette that “by encountering difficulties and dangers, they will ensure to themselves, the very highest of rewards, the applause and assistance of their fellow citizens.” As Gen. “Mad Anthony” Wayne organized an army to march against hostile Indians in 1793, he requested that Maj. Gen. Charles Scott muster only “the brave and virtuous mounted Volunteers of Kentucky [to] advance [and] participate of the glory.” Twenty years later, in the midst of the second war against Britain, another generation of citizen-soldiers exhibited a desire to face the trials of battle. Newspaper accounts of musters in Frankfort, Lexington, and Washington, Kentucky, describe militiamen volunteering in numbers sufficient to forgo the necessity of a draft. In 1813 the Lexington Kentucky Gazette commented on a company that had just organized in Lexington, praising both the volunteers’ quality and numbers: “We noticed with much pleasure some of our most distinguished citizens among the number, who have thus promptly obeyed the call of their country. . . . Indeed, we only fear that more have volunteered on this occasion than can with propriety be received—in round numbers, not less than 4 or 5 thousand. So large a body of undisciplined troops, but slightly organized, . . . will be unwieldy though formidable to the enemy, for they are full blooded Kentuckians.” The writer seemingly believed a smaller number would have been sufficient for the task at hand because all were Kentucky men. The encouragement of elders and officers emphasized appropriate role models and the rewards of participation. All confirmed that to join the fight would bring honor, glory, and an acknowledgment of manhood. Elizabeth Love of Frankfort, Kentucky, wished for her son James the advantages John Adams wrote of during the Revolution. “I hope you behaved like a brave man,” she countenanced. “The manner in which you conduct yourself now will mark your character through life.” Giving what comfort she could, Love assured her son that “should you fall in battle, the prais [sic] of your good deeds will shine through.” For moral sustenance, James Love and other militiamen in the War of 1812 could look to the examples of soldierly fortitude offered by George Washington and their own Kentucky comrades. In 1814 William Henry Harrison’s staff officers praised their commander and offered him as heir to Washington’s and Anthony Wayne’s mantles of courage: “We shall ever recollect with pride, and exultation that we have served under a General, who is the [ 131 ]

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disciple of Wayne, and who emulates the virtues of the immortal Washington.” In the spring of 1813 Gen. Green Clay also expected his men to live up to the standard of bravery their predecessors had established. As his troops prepared to depart Kentucky, he reminded them, “Our brothers in arms, who have gone before us to the scene of action, have acquired a fame, which should never be forgotten by you—a fame worth your emulation. . . . To support this reputation, purchased by valor and by blood, you must with fortitude meet the hardships and discharge the duties of soldiers.” He guaranteed his men that bravery under fire would give them the “opportunity to share the glory.” John Payne, while organizing a company of light dragoons, assured Kentucky’s young men that “the opportunity to acquire military renown will be ample—the thanks of your country and the approbation of your own hearts will follow. . . . I need not speak of the compensation, for . . . the soldier’s wealth is honour.” Armed with the paragons of Washington and Wayne, and schooled in their comrades’ valor and fortitude, another generation of citizensoldiers marched off to battle the British, ready to confront “death in its . . . tremendous horrors.” Military fame was not, however, guaranteed to all “competitors in the field of honor,” as one writer described the citizen-soldiers. As battle neared for Green Clay’s troops, he lectured them that “to fight is to conquer, to abandon our posts is to suffer disgrace. . . . Should there be however any so lost to every sense of honour as shamefully to abandon his post or order a retreat without proper authority he shall suffer death.” If Clay was not prepared to carry out this last threat literally, his army and the offending soldier’s community would surely administer the sentence figuratively, denying the coward the respect due a man. Conversely, some citizen-soldiers missed out on their chance at honor through no fault of their own. In 1812, when the enemy fled without offering battle, a disappointed militiaman lamented that “the only grief of our brave lads was that [the enemy] retired without giving us an opportunity of substantiating our pretensions to valour.” Sons of the 1812 militia had a chance to test their own valor in Mexico and made evident that their generation also expected to find manhood on the battlefield. The war fired their imagination and enthusiasm to a degree that surpassed the emotions of 1812. Recall the outpouring of volunteers to Governor Owsley’s call for troops as war became likely. John M. Hockaday of Winchester made his enthusiasm explicit when [ 132 ]

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he resigned from West Point in 1846 to volunteer for the Kentucky militia. “I feel both willing and capable,” he wrote to Governor Owsley, “of enduring the rigid discipline and privations of a soldier’s life. . . . All that I ask is that I may be placed in some situation where my capacity may be tried.” Like the Allen County Volunteers who had petitioned the governor to “give us a chance, we want to see if we can fight,” F. Y. Chambers’s men feared they had been “outstript in the race of glory” by other companies. Writing from the western tip of the state, Jonathan Crockett made known to the governor that “the citizens of this region are extremely anxious to have a chance at least to be represented by a few companies in the contested fields of Mexico.” Brig. Gen. Thomas Johnson, of the Fifteenth Regiment of the Kentucky militia, declared, “I stand as a Soldier and volunteer . . . place me where you pleas [sic] and I am ready for action.” Companies adopted a variety of strategies to win the volunteering sweepstakes. The Logan Riflemen opted to demand: “We must insist on the right of Green River to share the requisition.” The Adair Rangers, apparently none too confident, apologized for their various shortcomings: “We may not be very formal, but we want to go to the scene of war.” In another letter they explained the inaccuracies in an earlier application: “We may not be very good draughtsmen, but we want to go to the war. . . . Dont [sic] let us be cut Judge, if you can help it.” Others resorted to what can only be characterized as pleading. For example, Capt. B. L. Clarke of Simpson County wrote: “I repeat, Governor, nay I intreat [sic] you to permit us to participate in this war with the Mexicans.” G. W. Barbour from Smithland: “I wish to go and have determined to do so ‘on my own hook’ if not otherwise, If there is any position you can assign me however humble please let me have it.” And the concise George W. Johnston of Hopkinsville: “Any thing to go.” For the men who lost the race to volunteer, “great mortification and disappointment” awaited, as Thomas Helm explained to Governor Owsley, especially “as the assurance was given by you . . . that the company should be received.” From the 1790s to the 1840s, these citizen-soldiers, like Captains Ward and Maxey, “panted to face the enemy,” sharing an enthusiasm that demonstrates the importance of a battlefield experience to establishing a manly identity. Like their immediate predecessors and men throughout the centuries, citizen-soldiers in the Mexican War sought their manhood in battle. [ 133 ]

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The citizen-soldiers of 1846 who showed such enthusiasm were well aware that to fight manfully required courage, and courage was necessary because men died in battle. They had grown up listening at July Fourth celebrations to stories and speeches extolling the bravery and sacrifices of Washington and his Revolutionaries of ’76, and of William Henry Harrison and their own fathers in 1812, so they harbored no illusions that war was not a risky business. They longed to “participate in the glories of the coming campaign,” clamoring for “the post of danger.” One of the first Kentuckians to face the Mexican army was George B. Jones, who volunteered in 1836 to fight for Texas independence. After spending some time in Mexico, Jones understood the serious nature of what he had undertaken but remained firm in his resolve: “I have espoused the cause of Texas and nothing but death shall prevent my carrying my determination.” Ten years later James A. Gaither expressed a similar commitment in volunteering for service, but perhaps because he had yet to leave Kentucky, his words lacked the gravity and understanding of Jones and others who had seen battle. Gaither proposed to raise a company of volunteers “anxious to go even to the ‘Hall of Montezuma,’ ” ready “to ‘return with our shields or upon our shields.’” Just eight days before Zachary Taylor’s army attacked the city of Monterrey, Levi White assured his wife that he and the “boys of Louisville” were anxious to show “Kentucky spunk,” but he concluded with apprehension that at Monterrey “I expect we will eat our Christmas dinner or some of us find a grave.” Caroline Preston, a Louisville mother whose son sought a chance to fight, so feared the risks of war that she asked Governor Owsley to “refuse my son the request his ambition prompts.” Edward Hobson, writing to his father from Mexico in 1846, provides one explanation for the ambition of Preston’s son, indeed for the ambitions of all citizen-soldiers, to risk battle. Hobson confessed that the terror and glory of battle had deeply affected how he thought of himself: “I wouldn’t . . . take ten thousand dollars for the advantages that will be derived from . . . the hardships that I have undergone. . . . When we sit down to our meals if we should ever return home, not like babes and half-grown boys cry out that meat too fat, that bread not good . . . but more manly say I can put up with anything.” Like thousands of others, Hobson believed that his martial experiences transformed him from a half-grown boy to a full-grown man, articulating the principle that combat revealed who was a man and who was not. [ 134 ]

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Hobson’s expectation of returning home suggests the second way in which participation in battle established a claim to manhood. Home was at the heart of communal manhood and civic republicanism, both of which defined eighteenth-century constructs of masculinity. For the communal man, home was where males exercised their patriarchal authority and demonstrated their abilities to govern women and a household. Civic republicanism dictated that men subordinate their self-interest for the good of all, willingly risking life in defense of family and country. These traditional male expectations continued into the nineteenth century, giving masculine norms stability and continuity. Writing about Civil War soldiers, Reid Mitchell observes that “volunteering in itself was a sign of coming into manhood—it meant accepting a man’s duties to defend his home and country.” True men, sociologist Mark Kann tells us, “put themselves in harm’s way to protect . . . female dependents and family estates.” In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, Kentucky’s leaders reminded their citizen-soldiers of a duty to defend “the honor and interest of the state,” “the dignity of the government,” and “the honor, reputation, and glory of our dear country.” When an old enemy again threatened during the War of 1812, Gen. Green Clay exhorted his troops to “noble deeds of valour” in the protection of the “American character.” The Baltimore Whig praised the fortitude and virtue of Kentuckians who mustered for the country’s defense: “In Kentucky the whole population capable of bearing arms, consider themselves volunteers. . . . Men who have heretofore filled the highest and most honorable posts, have relinquished their stations, became privates in volunteer companies, and marched in defense of their country.” These Kentuckians were fighters, protectors, and most of all, men. “Go thou,” the Whig urged Baltimore’s male population, “and do so likewise.” Another generation of citizen-soldiers had the opportunity to do likewise against the Mexican army in both Texas and Mexico. George B. Jones, the volunteer who was so committed to Texas independence, saw his 1836 campaign as a “fight for liberty.” Ten years later, as rumors of war to the south again aroused Kentucky’s militiamen, Boyle County’s citizen-soldiers were ready “to rally themselves under the standard of their country, ready to defend it against the assaults of any foe whatever.” Honor and reputation demanded protection as well, and militiamen jumped to the call. The Covington Artillery Guards volunteered [ 135 ]

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“not for the purpose of throwing ourselves forward in the spirit of braggadocio” but to maintain the “glory of the state.” C. D. Semple was “anxious to illustrate the motto of Ky, ‘Our country right or wrong.’” And the Ballard Dragoons came “forth with alacrity” to preserve “the chivalry and patriotism of the state.” Like the ancients of Rome and America’s forefathers, the Covington Artillery Guards, the Ballard Dragoons, and militiamen elsewhere demonstrated their manhood by defending hearth and homestead on the field of battle. It was on the battlefields of the Revolution and the War of 1812 that fathers and grandfathers had shown their mettle and established the standard by which succeeding generations would judge bravery and manhood. Nothing less than a challenge could secure the manly character of their offspring, and here is the final nexus between manhood and battle. For the militiamen who marched north to Canada in 1812 or south to Mexico in 1846, the accomplishments of earlier citizen-soldiers excited both visions of glory and twinges of doubt. Looming over the sons and grandsons who came of age after the Revolution was the seemingly unattainable accomplishments of the founding generation. During the Civil War and later Victorian era, men exhibited the same tendency to cast their eyes toward heroic predecessors. Civil War soldiers acknowledged a responsibility to the past, believing that their fathers had willed them the gift of liberty, which they were obliged to protect. Union army Capt. Burage Rice wrote of the debts he and his companions owed to earlier generations: “By the sacrifice and blood of our fathers was the Republic founded and by the treasure, faith, honor, and blood of their sons shall the same glorious flag forever wave over us.” The conclusion of the Civil War and the passing of three decades did little to lessen the anxieties of American males in the 1890s when they compared themselves to the veterans of the Civil War. Did the younger generation possess the innate fortitude and moral strength necessary to equal the triumphs of their fathers? Would they even have an opportunity to face the ultimate trial of war? To exorcise these demons of self-doubt and inadequacy, men turned to the battlefield. With war came the opportunity to demonstrate the moral integrity of the Founding Fathers, despite an increasingly liberal American environment. In his study of gender and civic virtue in America, Mark Kann argues that war was a regenerative process. Prevailing attitudes in the early republic promoted the belief that “young [ 136 ]

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men’s participation in war would cure them of excessive selfishness and attractions of effete urban life and thereby redeem their civic virtue.” The Revolutionary generation had already demonstrated the manly effects of a military experience and therefore presented young men examples worthy of imitation. Commenting on America, French revolutionary Honore Mirabeau made this observation in the 1790s: Let the youth, the hope of his country, grow up amidst annual festivals, commemorative of the events of the war, and sacred to the memory of your heroes. Let him learn from his father to weep over the tombs of those heroes, and bless their virtues. . . . Intoxicated with a love of liberty . . . let this young hero, at frequent intervals, quit the toils of husbandry, to kindle his public spirit amidst war like exercises; let him learn the use of arms and accustom himself to discipline in the sight of the most respectable citizens. Let him, in their presence, pledge himself to defend his country and its laws.

Through war the son could justly stand shoulder to shoulder with the father. British truculence in 1811 presented Americans an opportunity to test themselves in the crucible of war and discover whether they had inherited their fathers’ virtue, courage, and manhood. Before the war, Americans had become anxious about their greedy nature, a shortcoming that was embarrassingly evident when they remembered the self-sacrifice and moral authority of the founding generation. During the congressional debate over nonintercourse in 1810, Kentuckian Henry Clay warned his fellow representatives not to expect leadership and protection from “the illustrious founders of our freedom,” for time had “withered arm and wrinkled brow.” With “their deeds of glory and renown” passed to memory, “we shall want the presence and living example of a new race of heroes to supply their place, and to animate us to preserve unviolated what they atchieved [sic].” South Carolinian John C. Calhoun, chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations, expressed similar sentiments in a report on the war with England presented to Congress in June 1812. He recommended resistance, by armed force if necessary, to maintain the nation’s honor and independence. “Americans of the present day,” he declared, “will prove to the enemy and to the world [and perhaps to themselves?], that we have not only inherited that liberty which our fathers gave us, but also the will and power to maintain it.” [ 137 ]

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That same year, Clay returned to the floor of Congress and argued that war with England would not only put the world on notice of American determination but also redeem national honor damaged in recent disputes with Great Britain over unfair trade policies and impressment of U.S. sailors. A confrontation with the British, Clay predicted, would end with an American victory after an “open and manly war.” According to the Kentuckian, “a certain portion of military ardor . . . is essential to the protection of the country.” Moreover, an additional benefit of war would be “the reproduction and cherishing of a martial spirit amongst us.” Men were not fighting simply to protect liberty from a tyrannical monarch; they were struggling to regain the courage, discipline, and honor of the Revolutionaries, to prove themselves worthy heirs to the “spirit of ’76.” In Kentucky, Governor Charles Scott also summoned the spirit of America’s Revolutionaries in a message to the legislature. Writing with the authority of experience, the general-turned-politician reminded the state’s political leaders of where and how men were made: “It is in the rough school of adversity, that the nobel [sic] virtues of valor, patriotism and fortitude shine forth with distinguished lustre [sic]. The spirit of ’76 has too long slumbered. Let it again breathe in our councils and animate the children of worthy sires.” The Kentucky House of Representatives responded by proclaiming its support for war with Britain: “The time has perhaps arrived when some of the people of Kentucky will have to exchange the plowshare for the musket.” Acknowledging the military sacrifices and accomplishments of Scott and other Revolutionary heroes, House members insisted, “We should do injustice to the veterans who have toiled before us, by a comparison of their sufferings with the sufferings of those who may be now called to war.” Their place in the memories of future generations left no alternative course of action. Great Britain “has driven us to the last alternative—unqualified, base submission, or war. The American people cannot hesitate which of the two to choose. The curses of posterity would be upon us by submission.” The weak cowered in surrender; men proved their courage in war. Three months later, when Scott called for fifty-five hundred volunteers, he again summoned the nation’s forefathers: “Remember ’76. I will continue to indulge the hope that the same spirit still animates the children that did their fathers.” The same message reached citizen-soldiers and

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civilians at political rallies and celebrations. At a barbecue organized in Lexington to celebrate the declaration of war in June of 1812, one resident lifted his cup in a toast to the local militia company soon to be marching north to battle: “May the volunteers of this regiment never disgrace their predecessors.” The state’s political leadership looked to the Revolution’s heroes as exemplars of courage and masculinity, but the frontiersmen and settlers who first explored the Kentucky wilderness also lived on as models of manhood. A Lexington Kentucky Gazette writer, comparing a company of 1812 volunteers to the first transmontane explorers, boasted that “men more hardy and determined, or more capable of braving the fatigues of an active campaign, we have never seen. They are the sons and true representatives of those old warriors, who first conquered and defended, and then settled Kentucky. They will support the reputation which Kentucky has acquired for valour and patriotism.” Apparently, Capt. George Trotter’s militiamen did not disappoint, as the Kentucky Gazette reported: “From all the information we can collect, both officers and men, did their duty and maintained the credit which our first settlers acquired for Kentucky.” Some writers voiced concern that the second generation of Americans might fail to maintain the virtue of their Revolutionary fathers, raising further doubts about their contemporaries’ manhood. In 1801 Stanley Griswald preached a sermon of doubt and despair: “Where are our fathers? . . . Where are our former men of dignity . . . who in their day appeared like men?” Now America’s males were “more disposed to act like children than men.” Kentucky poets reiterated Griswald’s theme, suggesting that their fellow citizens lacked the military ardor and patriotism of the heroes of 1776. The 1811 poem “New Yankee Doodle” questioned American resolve in meeting British atrocities: I guess if father was not dead He’d think us very blandly And ask where all the fire had fled Of yankee doodle dandy.

Similar sentiments appeared in the 1814 poem “Martial Hymn”: Vile party spirit, hence! Like brothers all unite;

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Nature’s first law is self defense And Liberty her right For this our patriots fought, for this our fathers bled; And shall they bleed and die for nought? O, never be it said!

Despite the doggerel’s pessimistic view of American manhood and the dismal record of U.S. troops in the war, the country survived as a sovereign nation, prompting a letter from “A Virginian, Retired in Kentucky,” which praised the “Citizens of Kentucky, brave sons of the West,” and declared them a credit to the men of 1776. “You have done your duty,” he wrote with reverence, “and future generations will say, you were worthy of your sires, and the sacred legacy which they bequeathed.” In battle the citizen-soldiers of 1812 convinced at least some that they were indeed the sons of their fathers and men in their own right. The generation that followed the “brave sons of the West” and participated in the Mexican War suffered the same doubts of their fathers, anxieties exacerbated by the accomplishments of the men who fought in the War of 1812. Southbound militia volunteers in the 1840s listened to stories about War of 1812 veteran Henry Clay Irvine, who possessed “uniform correct habits” and a “manly deportment,” and Maj. Charles S. Clarkson’s “stout heart and a cool head” in battle under William Henry Harrison. Such stories motivated Kentuckians to follow these past heroes by joining the war effort. When H. Groesbeck of Covington volunteered his unit of artillerymen for Mexican service, he assured the governor that “the blood of Kentuckians courses in their veins, and they desire to emulate the deeds of their fathers.” The volunteers of the Henry County Cavalry also made sure Governor Owsley knew of their heritage and eagerness to carry on the legacy of their fathers. “Sir,” First Lieutenant Charles Marshall wrote with pride, “we have a company of Kentuckians born free, and are now panting to sustain the reputation given to them by their ancestors.” Joseph Powell of the Covington Guards wrote to Owsley, fearing that the governor might reject his company of infantry. Pleading with the governor, Powell averred that he and his men were “anxious to sustain so far as in us lay the glory and chivalry of our fathers” and to prove that they “had lost none of that noble impulse

[ 14 0 ]

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that animated the spirit of our fathers. . . . In the true spirit of our ancestors we . . . are now ready, to fight for our Country, right or wrong.” As the war progressed, the volunteers fighting in Mexico began to produce their own heroes. At the Battle of Monterrey in September 1846, John Lillard wrote that “the volinteers and Texin Rangers [sic] fought manfully, never did a set of men show more bravery than they did.” And a parting shot at the professional army: “The regulars gave way.” As a consequence of its egalitarian and democratic nature, the militia offered to essentially all white males a refuge of masculinity through its association with manhood and battle in three ways: combat reaffirmed the accepted and ancient interrelationship between martial action and constructs of masculinity; fighting to defend home and honor demonstrated civic virtue and communal manhood; and facing the trials of battle banished the self-doubt and internal whispers of inadequacy stirred by the manly legacy of preceding generations. The letters, orders, and speeches of militiamen and their communities make apparent these consequences of battle on male identity. There was, however, a deeper, less apparent relationship between combat and manhood. War and battle, by their very nature, demanded courage and involved the risk of death. But while death deprived the soldier of life, it also ensured eternal manhood. George L. Mosse, in his study of gender norms, finds that the association of heroic death and manhood permeated Greek culture. Among the Greeks, “heroism, death, and sacrifice became associated with manliness.” Heroic death’s association with manhood endured into the eighteenth century, but attitudes had changed in Western culture, from accepting death as a part of an earthly existence to confronting it as an adversary. Phillipe Aries argues that societies met this shift in attitudes by creating memorials to the dead: “Memory conferred upon the dead a sort of immortality. . . . [In cemeteries,] the tombs of heroes and great men would be venerated by the state.” Americans, Mark Kann finds, also “gave meaning to mortality by perpetuating the memory of the dead.” Soldiers and their families understood that with death in battle came not only respect and honor but a place in memory among community or national heroes. In a 1783 sermon, George Duffield recalled the Revolution’s fallen troops: “Number them not of the dead. They are enrolled in the list of glory and fame, and

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shall live immortal, beyond the death of the grave.” And recall mother Elizabeth Love’s 1813 instructions to her son James: “Should you fall in battle, the prais [sic] of your good deeds will shine through.” Nancy Hartsock’s study of heroism and masculinity probes deeper into this relationship among manhood, battle, and death. She argues that “masculinity has been centrally structured by a linked fear of and fascination with the problems of death, mortality, and oblivion.” According to Hartsock, man’s anxiety over his eventual death and disappearance from the collective community memory pushed him to find a means to secure his immortality, figuratively if not literally. Many found the answer on the battlefield. Paradoxically, death in combat ensured eternal life. A man’s death and subsequent rebirth in the masculine community of fellow fallen soldiers manifested itself in the collective memory, thereby achieving immortality. Kann finds that following the Revolution, “American men still hoped to cheat death by protecting and promoting . . . memories of the dead;” thus “they robbed mortality of its finality.” An 1811 verse in commemoration of Kentucky militiaman Joseph H. Daviess illustrates how this relationship between death and eternal life found expression in the community consciousness: Who to their country’s welfare freely give The sacrifice of life, forever live As bright examples to the unborn brave, To shew how virtue rescues from the grave.

Kentucky militiamen mustered for service on the frontier, for the campaign to Canada, and for the march to Mexico, believing that their deaths would reaffirm their masculinity, guarantee their immortality, and secure them a place of honor in the memories of their community and country with the soldiers of 1776 and 1812. In 1861 two presidents in a divided nation asked that volunteers from North and South accept the challenges and dangers of a civil war. Newspapers from Baton Rouge to Boston trumpeted the call for men to defend their country, their families, and their manhood. Many of those who answered the call believed themselves fortunate, a generation blessed with the chance to win manly glory. For many of their fathers and grandfathers, the opportunity to demonstrate courage and manhood did not come so easily. Fate had not offered them a grand war.

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Moreover, the eighteenth-century masculine ideals of self-sacrifice and civic virtue were being swept aside by self-interest and individualism. Indeed, just who was the true man—the father who sacrificed time and sweat for family and community, or the entrepreneur who toiled long hours for personal profit? In the militia, both found a martial experience to prove themselves the legitimate heirs of their all but mythical forefathers.

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:feZclj`fe

ci t i z e ns mor e t h a n sol d ie r s

The militia’s range of activities and its influence on definitions of masculinity provide evidence of the citizen-soldiers’ continued relevance and vitality in the early republic. The prevailing interpretation of the militia as either defunct or irrelevant, as manned by tipsy semi-soldiers under the command of clownish colonels, does not survive close scrutiny. The militiamen’s influence reached beyond the narrow responsibilities of a purely martial institution as they made significant contributions to the social, political, and cultural maturation of the public sphere. The militia reveled in the public eye, taking to holiday streets for parades or crowded fields for political barbecues. On each occasion they reinforced the corporate nature of society, reminding audiences of the ties that bound one to another in community and fellowship. Rich and poor, black and white, male and female joined in when citizen-soldiers paraded through town or when militia officers and town elders gave a holiday oration. All who smelled hickory smoke and barbecue could gather at Maxwell’s Spring in Lexington and partake of the summer’s bounty. The shared beef and bourbon, however, concealed a subtext of social division hidden in the comity of these festivals. The militia’s decision to mark particular events and the messages communicated through word and ritual reinforced and legitimated social distinctions and the political philosophies of the hegemonic culture. Each muster and each parade of the smartly uniformed volunteers reaffirmed the ideals of a wellordered, disciplined society and respect for authority. Moreover, the militia’s celebratory rituals promoted loyalty to country and political party, prescribed appropriate behavior for the men who were included and the women who were excluded, and reinforced the social pecking order. [ 14 4 ]

conclusion

Ritualism also sustained the militia’s self-identity and male unity. Marching, uniforms, and a weapons culture based on tradition and custom set militiamen apart from their civilian neighbors, reinforcing their exclusivity and the racial and gender unity of the white male participants. The practice of toast making further supported the hierarchical social ladder as the rounds of drinking excluded the “American Fair,” blacks, and mulattos but welcomed white men from farm and field, from courthouse and Congress. Although the offering of toasts was normally restricted to captains, majors, mayors, and the like, the shared experience of memorializing reaffirmed the hegemonic power shared by all white males. Within these all-male organizations, masculinity was defined and the bonds of male unity were forged. Citizen-soldiers’ shared ideologies, experiences, and customs encouraged a transformation as they celebrated, drilled, fought, and even died together. Writing in 1843, the biographer of Col. Richard M. Johnson described how, through a shared martial experience, disparate individuals developed a corporate identity based on masculine qualities and fraternal bonds. Referring to Johnson’s regiment that fought at the Battle of the Thames in 1813, the biographer wrote, “They were as brothers. There was no austerity required in the officers, no degrading submission on the part of the privates; but they were equals, all impelled by the same patriotic spirit, and each one esteemed it his glory to observe the strictest discipline without compulsion. A bond of fraternity united them as one. Col. Johnson, though their commander, regarded each one as a brother and an equal; he never could relish praise for the deeds which they performed, unless they were sharers with himself in that praise.” Militia service created both an environment that legitimated men’s racial, gendered, and hierarchical notions of society and a place to confirm the ties of fellowship that defined a brotherhood of equals, albeit a brotherhood that excluded all but white men. According to sociologist W. Lloyd Warner, celebrating, politicking, or the simple act of joining as a community “draw[s] all people together to emphasize their similarities and common heritage, to minimize their differences, and to contribute to their thinking, feeling and acting alike.” Such events are “a sacred symbol system which functions periodically to unify the whole community.” Emile Durkheim makes a similar point in his study of religion: “There can be no society which does [ 145 ]

conclusion

not feel the need of upholding and reaffirming at regular intervals the collective sentiments and the collective ideas which make its unity and its personality.” He further observes that “this moral remaking cannot be achieved except by the means of reunions, assemblies and meeting where the individuals, being closely united to one another, reaffirm in common their common sentiments.” Although Durkheim’s subject is a people’s faith, his argument, like Warner’s, is useful for understanding the militia’s contribution to the evolution of nineteenth-century society. The ritualistic symbols employed and ideas promoted by citizen-soldiers created and then reaffirmed a sense of oneness. The militia’s role as the steward of public celebrations and as a representative, collective symbol of family and friends fostered community identity. Whether the Fourth of July, a political rally, or a meeting to debate hemp prices, each militia gathering nourished and strengthened the sinews of the civic body. Mary Ann Clawson maintains that in the early republic, fraternal orders and volunteer societies “played an important role in organizing the social and cultural life of American communities,” a view supported by historian John L. Brooke, who argues that such associations “stood at the epicenter of efforts to define and redefine the public arena in the new nation.” If this was indeed the impact of fraternal organizations, then historians have underestimated the militia’s significance and contribution to the development of American society. Given its geographic pervasiveness, decades of existence, and range of activities, the militia’s influence on individual communities and American society as a whole exceeded that of any other formal community organization. Unlike Faulkner’s fictional Yoknapatawpha citizen-soldiers, the fleshand-blood militia of the early nineteenth century remained a viable and valuable institution.

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Using militia muster rolls, census and tax records, and court documents to identify and trace individual militia members’ income, involvement in politics, and slave ownership, it is possible to draw some general conclusions about where they fit within their communities in terms of socioeconomic status and political power and influence. In the late eighteenth century, militia officers and their men were moderately successful in both financial and political affairs. Their successors in the War of 1812 performed even better, but the men who later fought in Mexico marched south with little wealth or political experience. The data in the tables that follow represent a ten-county area in Kentucky’s central Bluegrass Region, with Lexington and Fayette County at the center. The other eight counties are Bourbon, Clark, Garrard, Franklin, Jessamine, Madison, Mercer, Scott, and Woodford. This selection of counties allows the examination of both urban and rural communities. With few exceptions, extant muster rolls from the Kentucky militia are from three periods: the frontier era (1790–1811), the War of 1812 (1812–1814), and the Mexican War (1846–1847). In order to compare the financial and political success of militiamen across periods, analyses of officers and selected companies of enlisted men were conducted for each of the three periods, based on census and tax records. In addition, more intensive analyses were performed of two companies from the frontier era, one company from the War of 1812, and one company from the Mexican War. The latter included examination of deed and court documents in addition to census and tax records. Note that in the tables dealing with slave ownership as an indication of wealth, the median is included to compensate for figures that might skew the average inordinately high. The Frontier Era: 1790–1811 The starting point for the analysis of officers in this period is Glenn Clift’s The “Corn Stalk” Militia of Kentucky, which provides a published list of all known commissioned officers who served in Kentucky’s militia before the War of 1812. Because of Clift’s thoroughness and the abundance of muster rolls, a compre-

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a p p e nd i x hensive analysis of officers would be problematic, so every tenth name was selected from the lists from the defined counties, for a sample of 314 names. An examination of tax lists and census records reveal the following data on slave ownership among the officers: Table 1. Slave Ownership among Selected Officers, 1790–1811 Slave owners

112 (38.9%)

Total slaves owned

786

Average per owner

6.4

Median

5

Sources: Data from U.S. Census Indexes, 1790 and 1800; Kentucky Tax Lists, Kentucky Historical Society (khs). Note: N=314

State and federal legislative records produced the following data on officers’ service in the state legislature, the U.S. Congress, and the governor’s office: Table 2. Political Participation among Selected Officers, 1790–1811 Total men elected to office

42 (13.4%)

Offices held State House

35

State Senate

7

U.S. House

3

U.S. Senate

2

Governor

2

Sources: Data from Clift, Biographical Directory of the Kentucky General Assembly; U.S. Congress, Biographical Directory of the American Congress. Note: N=314

Eight muster rolls from Bourbon, Clark, Fayette, Madison, and Mercer counties provided names for the second analysis for this period, that of the ownership of slaves among enlisted men. Concerning political participation, only two men successfully ran for office, each gaining a seat in the state House of Representatives (not shown).

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a p p e nd i x Table 3. Slave Ownership among Selected Enlisted Men, 1790–1811 Slave owners

11 (8.8%)

Total slaves owned

51

Average per owner

4.6

Median

5

Sources: Data from U.S. Census Indexes, 1790 and 1800; Kentucky Tax Lists, khs. Note: N=125

The final analysis for 1790–1811 focuses on Byrd Price’s and John Wallace’s companies, both from Bourbon County and assigned to protect a local ironworks in 1793. Each unit consisted of twenty-two men, including four commissioned and noncommissioned officers. Out of both companies, only two men served in the state House of Representatives. Table 4. Byrd Price’s and John Wallace’s 1793 Muster Rolls Slaves owners

4 (9.1%)

Total slaves owned

12

Average per owner

3

Median

3

Land owners

7 (15.9%)

Total acreage owned

825

Average per owner

117.9

Median

100

Horse owners

13 (29.5%)

Total horses owned

45

Average per owner

3.5

Median

3

Sources: Data from U.S. Census Indexes, 1790 and 1800; Fayette and Bourbon County Tax Records, 1840, khs; Fayette and Bourbon County District and Circuit Court Deed Books A and B, microfilm, The University of Kentucky Special Collections Department (uksc). Note: N=44

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a p p e nd i x The War of 1812: 1812–1814 The number of officers from the ten-county region who participated in the War of 1812 was small enough in number to make sampling unnecessary. Based on the percentage of officers who owned slaves, it appears that the 205 men who led the citizen-soldiers of the Bluegrass Region to war against the British were moderately better off than the officers of the frontier era. Table 5. Slave Ownership among Selected Officers, War of 1812 Slave owners

106 (51.7%)

Total slaves owned

903

Average per owner

11.7

Median

6

Sources: Data from U.S. Census Indexes, 1810 and 1820. Note: N=205

The percentage of those who successfully ran for political office declined during this period, albeit only slightly. One War of 1812 veteran, Richard M. Johnson, attained the vice presidency. Table 6. Political Participation among Selected Officers, War of 1812 Total elected to office

21 (10.2%)

Offices held State House

20

State Senate

4

U.S. House

5

U.S. Senate

4

Governor

3

Vice president

1

Sources: Data from Clift, Biographical Directory of the Kentucky General Assembly; U.S. Congress, Biographical Directory of the American Congress. Note: N=205

The analysis of enlisted men for this period focused on four companies of 284 men who fought as part of the Kentucky Mounted Volunteers. The percentage of slave owners was more than double that of the previous period. None of the enlisted men won elected office.

[ 15 0 ]

a p p e nd i x Table 7. Slave Ownership among Selected Enlisted Men, War of 1812 Slave owners Total slaves owned

57 (20.1%) 275

Average per owner

4.8

Median

3

Sources: Data from U.S. Census Index, 1810. Note: N=284

Capt. Thomas Kennedy’s company of seventy Kentucky Mounted Volunteers provides the sample for this period’s detailed study. As suggested by the examination of enlisted men, members of Kennedy’s company were substantially better off financially than their predecessors. However, they were politically unsuccessful. Table 8. Capt. Thomas Kennedy’s 1812 Muster Roll Slaves owners Total slaves owned

18 (25.7%) 149

Average per owner

8.3

Median

5

Land owners Total acreage owned

24 (34.3%) 8,673

Average per owner

361.4

Median

138

Horse owners Total horses owned

39 (55.7%) 253

Average per owner

6.5

Median

5

Sources: Data from U.S. Census Indexes, 1810 and 1820; Garrard County Tax Records, 1840, khs; Garrard County Index to Deeds, Book D, Grantors, microfilm, uksc; Garrard County Index to Deeds, Book D, Grantees, microfilm, uksc. Note: N=70

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a p p e nd i x The Mexican War In contrast to the more than two hundred officers of the War of 1812, only sixtynine officers from the ten-county area traveled south to fight against the Mexican army. Furthermore, half of these men do not appear in the census records or tax lists. The relative young age of the men who volunteered to fill the ranks explains their poor showing in government records. For example, the men of Capt. Frank Chambers’s company, the Second Regiment of the Kentucky Foot Volunteers, averaged 22.6 years of age. Their captain was slightly below the average age, being only twenty-two years old. Lack of financial wealth also indicates the youth of these volunteers. The percentage of slave owners is half or less than that of earlier periods. Table 9. Slave Ownership among Selected Officers, Mexican War Slave owners

14 (20.3%)

Total slaves owned

128

Average per owner

9.1

Median

5.5

Sources: Data from U.S. Census Indexes, 1840 and 1850; Kentucky Tax Lists, khs. Note: N=69

Electoral records also indicate that the militiamen of the 1840s did not wield the same political power as some of their predecessors. Only two gained elected office, although they won a number of elections between them. Table 10. Political Participation among Selected Officers, Mexican War Total elected to office

2 (2.9%)

Offices held State House

2

State Senate

0

U.S. House

2

U.S. Senate

1

Governor

0

Sources: Data from Clift, Biographical Directory of the Kentucky General Assembly; U.S. Congress, Biographical Directory of the American Congress. Note: N=69

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a p p e nd i x Enlisted men of the Mexican War era experienced a similar decline in wealth, as demonstrated by slave ownership. None won political office. Table 11. Slave Ownership among Selected Enlisted Men, Mexican War Slave owners

16 (7.6%)

Total slaves owned

91

Average per owner

5.7

Median

2.5

Sources: Data from U.S. Census Index, 1840. Note: N=210

A closer study of Chambers’s company confirms the poor economic status of Mexican War militiamen. Table 12. Capt. Frank Chambers’s 1847 Muster Roll Slaves owners

1 (1.4%)

Total slaves owned

1

Average per owner

1

Median

1

Land owners

2 (2.8%)

Total acreage owned

29

Average per owner

14.5

Median

14.5

Horse owners

4 (5.6%)

Total horses owned

7

Average per owner

1.75

Median

1

Sources: Data from Franklin County Tax Records, 1840, khs; Franklin County Deeds General Cross Index, Vol. 2, microfilm, uksc. Note: N=71

These analyses are by no means definitive, but they do suggest trends in citizensoldiers’ economic and political circumstances in each period.

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Efk\j

Abbreviations The following abbreviations are used throughout the notes. fchs khs kmrrb uksc

Filson Club Historical Society, Frankfort, Kentucky Kentucky Historical Society, Frankfort Kentucky Military Records and Research Branch Library, Frankfort University of Kentucky Special Collections Department, Lexington 1. Rethinking the Social Role of the Militia

1. Faulkner, Requiem for a Nun, 5–6. 2. Rohrbough, The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, 30. 3. Habermas, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere; Arendt, The Human Condition. 4. Brooke, “Ancient Lodges and Self-Created Societies,” 276. Brooke’s primary focus is on Masonic orders; he does not include militia organizations. The influence of religious institutions may have exceeded that of the militia, but only if they are considered as a single, monolithic church. If, however, individuals are associated with their particular denomination, as they saw themselves, the collective church splinters into a diversity of creeds and faiths. For a discussion of religious divergence in the early republic, see Hatch, The Democratization of American Christianity. 5. Rotundo, American Manhood. 6. Stearns, Be a Man!, 23–25. 7. There are two institutional studies of U.S. citizen-soldiers. The first is Mahon’s History of the Militia and the National Guard, a narrative that recounts the political, legislative, organizational, and military history of the militia from its English origins to the National Guard in the 1970s. More recent is Doubler’s Civilian in Peace, Soldier in War. For additional surveys that range beyond periodic studies, see Dupuy, The National Guard, and Anderson, “Militia, Past and Pres-

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 5 –13 ent,” 75–79. While historians have directed some attention to the colonial and Revolutionary periods, there are few studies that address the militia of the early republic. One is Mahon’s brief, The American Militia. For a more recent work, see Flynn, The Militia in Antebellum South Carolina Society. 8. Shy, “A New Look at the Colonial Militia.” 9. Higginbotham, “The American Militia.” Shy, “The American Revolution,” makes a similar argument, that the militia presented a far more serious obstacle to the British than previously recognized. 10. Franklin, The Militant South, especially chapter 9. For a slightly more recent study of the militia and society, see Cunliffe, Soldiers and Civilians, especially chapters 6, 7, and 8. 11. Rowe, Bulwark of the Republic; Vourlojianis, The Cleveland Grays; Hubbs, Guarding Greensboro. The earliest study of this type appears to be Dayton, “ ‘Polished Boot and Bran New Suit.’” 12. Bell and Newby, Community Studies, 29–30, 39. 2. The Hunters of Kentucky 1. This account of the Kentucky militia’s military history is based on Stone, A Brittle Sword, chapters 1 through 6; and Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration, Military History, especially chapters 1 through 4. 2. Acts Passed at the Second Session of the General Assembly for the Commonwealth of Kentucky (Lexington, 1792), 5, uksc; and John D. Shane interview with James Dunlap, n.d., Doc. 12cc188, reel 85, Lyman C. Draper Collection on Microfilm, Ser. cc, Kentucky Papers, David Library of the American Revolution. 3. Wayne quoted in Stone, A Brittle Sword, 30. 4. Article 1, section 8. For an account of the Uniform Militia Act of 1792, see Doubler, Civilian in Peace, Soldier in War, 66–69. The Militia Act of 1903, better known as the Dick Act, named after long-time militia advocate and Ohio Representative Charles Dick, did away with the 1792 Militia Act and created the modern National Guard. Doubler, Civilian in Peace, Soldier in War, 143–45. 5. For Shelby’s proclamation, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 3, 1813. For the public response, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 10, 17, 1813. 6. The Court of Inquiry that reviewed the Kentuckians’ performance at New Orleans exonerated the militiamen for their retreat, citing lack of adequate weapons and improper placement in the line of battle by non-Kentucky officers. See Copy of the Court of Inquiry’s Findings, n.d., Doc. 8cc20, reel 83, Lyman C. Draper Collection on Microfilm, Ser. cc, Kentucky Papers, David Library of the [ 156 ]

n o t e s t o p a g e s 14 – 21 American Revolution; Stone, A Brittle Sword, 51; and Remini, The Battle of New Orleans, 158–64. 7. Paris Western Citizen, December 10, 1831; and Jackson quoted in Stone, A Brittle Sword, 53. 8. Paris Western Citizen, November 5, 1831; and Acts Passed at the Second Session of the General Assembly for the Commonwealth of Kentucky (Lexington, 1792), 14, uksc. 9. Acts Passed by the General Assembly for the Commonwealth of Kentucky (Lexington, 1799), 9, uksc. The actual date of passage was December 18, 1799. 10. Stone, A Brittle Sword, 59. 11. See appendix for more detailed data and an explanation of the methodology used for the analysis of militia members’ financial status and political participation. 12. Susan Davis, in Parades and Power, suggests that militiamen often occupied civil offices, but offers no quantitative evidence. Mahon, History of the Militia and the National Guard, and Cunliffe, Soldiers and Civilians, surprisingly do not address the relationship between militia service and political victories. 13. Aron, How the West Was Lost, 204. 3. Public Gatherings and Social Order 1. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 10, 1800. The first July Fourth celebration recorded in the Gazette took place in Lexington, July 4, 1788; see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 5, 1788. 2. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 23 and July 9, 1842. Beginning with the Gazette in 1788, essentially every newspaper carried accounts of Fourth of July commemorations. Issues published a couple of weeks before and a couple of weeks after the Fourth included plans for and accounts of celebrations. In addition to details from local commemorations, newspapers frequently carried descriptions of holiday events from larger cities like New York, Philadelphia, and Washington dc. For an additional account of Lexington’s Fourth of July celebrations, see McCullough, “Reminiscences of Lexington,” 6–9. For the importance of music and dancing to July Fourth celebrations, see Carden, Music in Lexington Before 1840. Militia companies also sponsored occasional dances and balls not associated with any particular holiday or celebration, especially during the cooler fall and spring months. See Staples, Amusements, 27. Despite the apparent success of the rendezvous at “Camp Scott,” there is only a hint that another encampment of this size formed in Kentucky. An undated newspaper article contained in the Lyman Draper Collection makes reference to a July Fourth oration given by a [ 157 ]

no t es t o pages 23 – 25 George Robertson at “Camp Madison.” No further information is given as to the place or time of the event. However, given that Madison County lies just fifty miles south of Scott County, it seems likely that “Camp Madison” was either the predecessor or progeny of “Camp Scott.” See Doc. 26cc2, reel 87, Lyman C. Draper Collection on Microfilm, Ser. cc, Kentucky Papers, David Library of the American Revolution. 3. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 9, 1796, and July 11, 1798. Organizations like the militia have historically taken a lead role in popular ceremonies, and in recent years there has been a virtual explosion of publications that analyze public celebrations. See Gillis, Commemorations; McNamara, Day of Jubilee; Newman, Parades and Politics; Ryan, Civic Wars; Travers, Celebrating the Fourth; and Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes. Mary Ann Clawson, in her study of fraternalism, notes that during the late medieval and early modern periods, guilds and confraternities were the principle force behind public ceremonial events; Clawson, Constructing Brotherhood, 35. 4. The first account of a Washington’s Birthday celebration in Kentucky was published in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 28, 1798. For further analysis of Washington’s Birthday, see Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 112–13, 118–20, 214–15; and Newman, Parades and Politics, 57–65. 5. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 25, 1806; October 24, 1822; October 12, 1833; and October 11, 1834. 6. For accounts of apparently nonpartisan celebrations of the battle’s anniversary, see Russellville Weekly Messenger, February 16, 1828; Frankfort Argus of Western America, January 7, 1829 (prior announcement), and January 11 and 19, 1831; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, January 12, 1833, January 11, 1838, and January 10, 1839. 7. Reprinted in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, January 17, 1835. 8. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, January 8, 1842, and January 28, 1843; and Frankfort Commonwealth, January 14, 1845. For a full analysis of the militia’s political activities, see chapter 5. 9. Capt. F. Kern to Coleman Daniel and John O. Harrison, February 23, 1850, Militia Records, kmrrb. 10. For accounts of Lafayette’s reception in the eastern states, see Russellville Weekly Messenger, September 11, 1824; and Louisville Public Advertiser, September 4, 18, and 25, 1824, and November 6, 1824. 11. For the Louisville militia’s plans for Lafayette’s visit, see Louisville Public Advertiser, October 13 and 16, 1824; April 16, 1825; and May 4 and 7, 1825. The

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no t es t o pages 25 – 2 8 account of Lafayette’s visit to Louisville and to Jeffersonville, Indiana, appeared in the Louisville Public Advertiser, May 14 and 18, 1825. 12. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 19, 1825. Lafayette’s visit to Lexington was a much anticipated event. The town’s volunteer militia companies began organizing the event nearly nine months early when they took the first steps to invite the general. See Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 23 and October 7, 1824. More specific preparations began in March and April when the various companies obtained uniforms and weapons; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 24, April 7, and April 21, 1825. Plans were finalized in early May for his arrival later that month; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 5, 1825. For another account of receptions for Lafayette, see Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes, 161. See Davis, Parades and Power, 65–66, for a description of Philadelphia’s militia reception. 13. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 9, 1819. For an account of the town’s preparations for Monroe’s visit, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 25, 1819; for a report on the dinner given in his honor, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 16, 1819. Monroe made a visit to Lexington a decade earlier in 1808, during which the town offered a cordial welcome and public dinner but not the fanfare that greeted the president in 1819; see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 30, 1808. Also see Staples, Amusements, 24–25; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 2 and 16, 1819. 14. For Jackson’s visits, see Louisville Public Advertiser, December 4, 1824, and April 2 and 9, 1825; and Frankfort Argus of Western America, January 28, 1829. For Van Buren’s visit, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 26, 1842. See Frankfort Palladium, July 1, 1812, for the account of Harrison’s visit as a military hero. For his later visit as president-elect, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, November 26, 1840. For Taylor’s visit, see Paris Western Citizen, February 23, 1849. 15. Frankfort Argus of Western America, July 1, 1829. For other examples of Clay’s militia receptions, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 29, 1818; July 22, 1819; and May 24, 1821; and Russellville Weekly Messenger, June 4, 1825. The militia also held public dinners or ceremonies for other lesser known civilians. See, for example, accounts of a ceremony staged for Salem Pyatt and Henry Riddle, both from Lexington, in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 16, 1813, and of a barbecue held for Dr. Joseph H. Holt of Paris, Kentucky, in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 8, 1824. 16. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1798, and July 8, 1816. 17. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 13, 1820, and August 12, 1824. For additional examples of toasts that make reference to Washington’s military career or refer to him as “General Washington,” see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1798;

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no t es t o pages 2 8 – 29 July 6, 1801; July 9, 1802 (2); July 5, 12, and 19, 1803; July 12 and 19, 1808; July 11, 1809 (3); July 10, 1810; February 26, 1811; February 25 and August 4, 1812; July 11 and 18, 1814; March 4 and July 8, 1816; July 5, 1817; July 16, 1819; February 25, July 6, and July 13 (2), 1820; February 27, 1823; February 24, 1826; and February 23, 1827. See also Paris Western Citizen, July 10, 1846. For toasts to Washington’s civilian accomplishments and toasts that make no specific reference to either aspect of his public life, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1798; July 10, 1804; July 9, 1805; July 5 and 12, 1806; July 11, 1809; July 10, 1810; February 26 and July 16, 1811; July 7, July 21, and August 4, 1812; July 13, 1813; July 11, 1814; July 5, 1817; July 6, 1820; July 5, 1821; July 17 and August 7, 1823; July 21, 1826 (2); and July 12, 1838. See also Paris Western Citizen, July 10, 1846. 18. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 4, 1812, and July 12, 1803. See Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 12, 1838, for another toast promoting Washington as a model of civic virtue. For additional toasts proclaiming Washington as “savior” of the nation, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 19, 1803, and July 11, 1809. 19. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 10, 1804, and July 13, 1820. For additional toasts to Franklin, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1798; July 25, 1799; July 12, 1803; July 10, 1804; July 9, 1805; July 5 and 12, 1806; July 19, 1808; July 11, 1809; July 10, 1810; February 26, 1811; February 25, 1812; July 13, 1813; July 11 and 18, 1814; July 5, 1817; July 7 and 21, 1818; July 16, 1819; July 6 and 13, 1820; July 17 and August 7, 1823; and August 12, 1824. 20. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 19, 1803, and July 10, 1804. For other toasts to Jefferson with a partisan flavor, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1809 (2), and February 28, 1814. 21. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 12, 1838; July 13, 1813; and July 21, 1812. See also Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 10, 1810 (2); February 26, 1811; February 25, July 7, and August 4, 1812; July 11 and 18, 1814; March 4 and July 8, 1816; July 5, 1817 (2); August 3, 1818; July 16, 1819; July 6 (2) and 13, 1820; February 27, 1823; August 12, 1824; July 21, 1826; and February 23, 1827. See also Paris Western Citizen, July 10, 1846. 22. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 21, 1812. For additional partisan toasts, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 19, 1808; July 11, 1809; July 10, 1810; February 26, 1811; and July 11, 1814. 23. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 12, 1838, and August 12, 1824. For additional nonpartisan salutes, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 5, 1817; July 16, 1819; July 6 and 13, 1820; and February 27, 1823. 24. Toasts to John Hancock, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 10, 1810; toasts to John Adams, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1809, July 5, 1817, and Febru-

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no t es t o pages 3 0 – 32 ary 23, 1827; toasts to Hancock and Adams, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 10, 1804, February 25, July 7, and July 21, 1812, July 13, 1813, July 16, 1819, and July 6, 1820; toasts to Patrick Henry, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 16, 1819; and toasts to Nathanael Greene, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1809, July 13, 1813, and July 16, 1819. 25. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 9, 1796, and July 11, 1798; also February 28, 1798; July 25, 1799; July 12, 1803; July 10, 1804; July 5 and 12, 1806; July 11, 1809 (2); July 10, 1810; February 26 and July 16, 1811; February 25, July 21, and August 4, 1812; July 11 and 18, 1814; March 4 and July 8, 1816; July 5, 1817; February 25, July 6, and July 13, 1820; February 27 and August 7, 1823; February 24 and July 21, 1826 (4). 26. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 3, 1813. For additional toasts to the Battle of the Raisin, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 13, 1813; February 28, July 11, and July 18, 1814; July 5, 1817; February 24 and July 21, 1826; and July 12, 1838. Accounts of the battle may be found in Hickey, The War of 1812, 85–86; Stone, A Brittle Sword, 44–45; and Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration, Military History, 81–84. 27. Among other battles specifically mentioned in holiday toasts were Fallen Timbers, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1809; Tippecanoe, February 25, 1812, and August 3, 1813; Fort Meigs, August 3, 1812, and February 24, 1826; and New Orleans, July 13, 1820, February 24, 1826, and February 23, 1827. 28. Rousseau, The Government of Poland, 8. 29. Verba quoted in Greenberg and Parker, The Kennedy Assassination, 354–55. Waldstreicher notes the attention paid to accounts of parades, speeches, and toasts that appeared in print; see Waldstricher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 207. 30. Len Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, persuasively demonstrates how celebrations, toasts, and holiday rituals created and conveyed nationalism. See also Duncan, Communication and Social Order, 262–63; Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 73, 120, 124, 133, 158; and Snyder, Citizen-Soldiers and Manly Warriors, 52–53. For a discussion of how Washington’s Birthday contributed to the spread of nationalism, see Newman, Parades and Politics, 57–65; and Gillis, Commemorations. 31. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 5, 1788, May 22, 1804, and April 10, 1841. 32. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 21, 1840; also Lexington Observer and Reporter, May 27, 1840; and Paris Western Citizen, May 15, 1840. 33. J. R. Cardwell and Phillip B. Thompson to Governor R. P. Letcher, March 22, 1841, Militia Records, kmrrb Library; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 26, 1841; and Paris Western Citizen, June 25, 1841. [ 161 ]

no t es t o pages 33 – 35 34. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 26 and April 23, 1842. 35. For accounts of the militia’s participation in dinners for or the inauguration ceremony of Governor Joseph Desha, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 26 and September 9, 1824, and November 10, 1826, and Louisville Public Advertiser, September 1, 1826; of Governor Charles Metcalfe, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 29, 1828; of Governor James Clarke, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 29 and September 1, 1836; of Governor Robert Letcher, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 3 and 10, 1840; of Governor Charles A. Wickliffe, see Paris Western Citizen, September 13, 1839. Governor Clinton of New York visited Columbus, Ohio, in 1825, where militiamen met him at the edge of town and escorted the governor to the town square; Louisville Public Advertiser, August 10, 1825. The militia also mustered to fire a cannon salute when the governor of Tennessee visited Lexington in 1845; see S. D. McCullough to Quartermaster General Dudley, July 15, 1845, Militia Records, kmrrb Library. For an account of similar militia receptions and escorts in Boston, see Harrington, “The National Lancers of Boston,” 2–6. 36. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 12, 1806, and July 12, 1808. For toasts to Scott before his term as governor, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 5 and 12, 1803; July 10, 1804; July 9, 1805; July 5 and 12, 1806; and July 12 and 19, 1808. For toasts to Scott while he served as governor, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 10, 1810; July 11, 1809; February 26 and July 16, 1811; February 25, July 7 and 21, and August 4, 1812. For salutes to Scott following his term as governor and after his death on October 22, 1813, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 13, 1820; July 13, 1813; February 28 and July 11, 1814; March 4, 1816; July 16, 1819; February 27, 1823; February 24, 1826; and July 12, 1838. See also Ward, Charles Scott and the “Spirit of ’76”; Kohn, Eagle and Sword, 111–12, 154–57; Stone, A Brittle Sword, 17–18, 25–38; and Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration, Military History, 57–62. 37. Hickey, The War of 1812, 137–39; Stone, A Brittle Sword, 42–51; and Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration, Military History, 85–95. 38. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 13, 1813, and July 8, 1816. For other toasts to Shelby, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 28, July 11, and July 18, 1814; March 4, 1816; July 5, 1817; July 16, 1819; July 6, 1820; February 27, 1823; and February 23, 1827. For accounts of militia parades and receptions, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 9, 1792; September 1, 1812; and November 8 and 29, 1813. 39. Johnson’s visits are recorded in Lexington Kentucky Gazette, January 3, 1814; August 29, 1836; and April 10, 1841. Toasts to Johnson appear in Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 13, 1820; also Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 4, 1812, July

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no t es t o pages 35 – 37 17, 1823, and especially July 12, 1824. For Johnson’s war experiences, see Hickey, The War of 1812, 137–39; Stone, A Brittle Sword, 46–51; and Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration, Military History, 85–95. 40. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 9, 1805; July 10, 1810; July 21, 1812; and July 16, 1819. For Adair’s reception, see Russellville Weekly Messenger, June 17, 1820. For toasts to William Henry Harrison, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 7, 1812; July 13 and August 3, 1813; February 28, 1814; and July 5, 1817. 41. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 11, 1812, and May 16, 1814. Joseph Metcalfe to Gen. A. W. Dudley, May 4, 1847, Militia Records, kmrrb Library. The Bourbon Volunteers also received a military reception when they returned to Paris in the summer of 1848; see Paris Western Citizen, July 21 and 28, 1848. John P. Boyd’s brief biography can be found in Fredriksen, American Military Leaders, 70–71. 42. Waldstreicher demonstrates how, despite regionalism and partisanship, celebrations created a national sentiment in the early republic. See Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, especially chapters 4 and 5. Also note Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 10. Mary Nelson Winship shows how Kentuckians specifically maintained both a national and regional identity; Winship, “Kentucky in the New Republic.” 43. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 22, 1804. For other celebrations of the Louisiana Purchase, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 16, 1803, and May 15, 1804. Kentuckians also read of similar events in other locations. See, for example, Frankfort Guardian of Freedom, February 4, 1805, for the account of a Louisiana Purchase celebration in New Orleans. Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 205, 286–92. 44. Robert McAfee’s Journal, June 3, 1808, Robert Breckenridge McAfee’s Papers, uksc; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 5, 12, and 26, 1809. For other examples of muster day events, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 26 and June 9, 1812. Historians have documented the comical nature of militia musters in the colonial and early national periods. For accounts of colonial musters, see Isaac, The Transformation of Virginia, 1740–1790, 104–10; Cunliffe, Soldiers and Civilians, 215–41; Davis, Parades and Power, 49–72; and Boucher, “The Colonial Militia as a Social Institution.” The festival atmosphere of musters continued through the early national and antebellum periods. For example, see Garrison, “Battalion Day”; and Marro, “Vermont’s Local Militia Units.” Despite the pervasiveness of these accounts, I found no record of such shenanigans at Kentucky musters. I make no claim that they did not occur, only that I found no evidence.

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no t es t o pages 37 – 4 0 45. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 12 and 19, 1839. As with the celebrations of Kentucky’s early settlement, planning for the Lexington Light Infantry’s anniversary began well in advance. Members started organizing the event nine months ahead, appointing committees to establish dates, activities, speakers, and guest lists. See Lexington Kentucky Gazette, January 31, 1839. 46. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 11, 1805. In the 1840s communities often gave barbecues specifically for their volunteer companies; see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, April 29, 1843; Frankfort Commonwealth, May 7, 1845; and Paris Western Citizen, June 25, July 9, and July 23, 1847. 47. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 2, 1802; Frankfort Guardian of Freedom, July 7, 1802. The Lexington Kentucky Gazette reported Louisiana Purchase celebrations in Lexington, Paris, Woodford County, and Scott County; see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 15 and 22, 1804. New Orleans held a similar celebration a few months later, including parading militia units; see Frankfort Guardian of Freedom, February 4, 1805. In northern communities, African-American militia units marked holidays as well. For an account of one unit’s celebration of Abolition Day, the anniversary of the closing of the Atlantic slave trade, see Goldman, “Black Citizenship and Military Self-preservation in Antebellum Massachusetts.” 48. Louisville Public Advertiser, July 16 and 20, 1825; Frankfort Argus of Western America, November 2, 1831; and Paris Western Citizen, October 29, 1831. 49. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 1, May 8, and June 5, 1810. Also see Hayse, “Lexington’s Early Amateur Actors.” 50. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 12, 1816; August 5 and 12, 1824; and September 26, 1836. In 1837 Lexington’s Volunteer Artillery staged a similar shooting competition; see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 31, 1837. 51. Doyle, The Social Order of a Frontier Community, 12; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1835. Recent studies of celebrations and community development describe the unifying effect of celebrations; see Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 105; Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes, 80, 87, 111–12; Newman, Parades and Politics, 8, 65; and Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 51. 52. Russell’s speech reported in Russellville Mirror, January 5, 1809. Travers notes the deceptive nature of displays of public unity in Celebrating the Fourth, 86–87. For accounts of the militia’s role in establishing order and the association of militia leadership with community leadership, see Rohrbough, The TransAppalachian Frontier, 7, 116–17; Perkins, Border Life, 132, 138, 142; and Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 68. Waldstreicher also points out that by the 1780s, unruly celebrations had given way to more structured and ordered

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 4 0 – 41 popular displays as Americans learned “how orderly nationalist rejoicing could express their political differences.” Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 107. 53. Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 153; and Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes, 75, 80–81. This relationship among militia officers and community officials was not an exceptional occurrence; see Kutolowski and Kutolowski, “Commissions and Canvasses.” For the relationship between control of public ceremonies and speeches and the concomitant access to power, see Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 225; Davis, Parades and Power, 70–71; and Duncan, Communication and Social Order, 264. For a discussion of the role of audiences in rituals and community events, see Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 71–72; and Duncan, Communication and Social Order, 262. 54. The statute defining officer elections may be found in Acts Passed at the Second Session of the General Assembly for the Commonwealth of Kentucky (Lexington, 1792), 6, uksc. Dana Nelson describes the emergence of a white male identity in the early republic; Nelson, National Manhood. Newman documents the widespread participation at celebrations, showing that at a 1799 July Fourth event in Scott County, Kentucky, nearly 45 percent of the county’s adult white male population attended; Newman, Parades and Politics, 91, 103, 109–10. For descriptions of the role of public events in reinforcing white male unity, see Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 105, 242–43; Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 184–85; and Duncan, Communication and Social Order, 275. For an analysis and description of officer elections, see Skeen, Citizen Soldiers in the War of 1812, 56; Mahon, History of the Militia and National Guard, 16, 36, 87; and Doubler, Civilian in Peace, Soldier in War, 36, 68–69, 90–91. 55. For an analysis of political rituals and their role in defining social relationships and functions, see Lukes, “Political Ritual and Social Integration.” Citing street parades and ceremonies in nineteenth-century Philadelphia, Susan Davis also argues that these celebrations helped to maintain public order and deference to authority; see Davis, Parades and Power, 70. 56. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 4 and July 21, 1812. Historian George B. Forgie makes a similar argument in his psychological study of the Civil War era. “For Americans searching for models of virtue more certain than parents,” Forgie writes, “the founding heroes provided natural and obvious choices. Individual imitation of the characters of the founders would tend to the development not only of a common national character, but one of the most desirable kind. It was, further, widely assumed that since the characters of founders provided the foundation for the Republic, imitation of their characters by the rising generation could preserve it.” See Forgie, Patricide in the House Divided, 18. For

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no t es t o page 42 an examination of martial characteristics and their relationship to concepts of masculinity, see chapters 6 and 7. 57. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 19, 1808, and July 17, 1823. For additional toasts to the “American Fair” that describe appropriate male behavior, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 7, 1805; July 12, 1806; July 12, 1808; February 26, 1811; February 25, 1815; August 3, 1813; February 28, July 11, and July 18, 1814; July 5, 1817; and July 13, 1820. A few toasts did more directly address appropriate behavior for republican women; see, for example, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 4, 1812; August 3, 1813; July 13, 1820; February 24, 1826; and February 23, 1827. For a discussion of the role played by women in the nation’s founding and their significance to the creation of a republican society, see Kerber, Women of the Republic; and Norton, Liberty’s Daughters. For the most lucid analysis of women’s participation in civic rituals in early America, see Kierner, “Genteel Balls and Republican Parades.” Kierner argues that prior to the American Revolution, public rituals such as genteel balls and holiday parades gave elite white women “public influence, if not political power” (186). However, with the conclusion of the war, “civic rituals, which promoted a masculine and militarized ideal of citizenship, relegated women of all classes to the fringes of public life” (186). In Kentucky, the emphasis on male behavior in toasts ostensibly directed toward women supports the second half of Kierner’s thesis. She also maintains that women were rarely, if ever, in audiences for the after-dinner ritual of toast making. For Kentucky celebrations, I found no evidence conclusively indicating women’s attendance or lack thereof. For example, the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 12, 1803, reported: “After the toasts were drank, the company returned to town, happy in again having an opportunity of celebrating the birthday of Liberty, and evincing to the world the harmony and good order that pervades a mixed company of true republicans. . . . The evening was concluded with a ball, at which the smiles and virtues of the fair, and the decorum and valor of the youth seemed to preside.” Whether women attended or heard the rounds of toast making is unclear. 58. Morris, Becoming Southern, 149. Kierner demonstrates how restrictions on speakers reinforced social status; Kierner, “Genteel Balls and Republican Parades,” 198. 59. Kierner, “Genteel Balls and Republican Parades,” 195–204. For additional interpretations of women’s participation in, exclusion from, and significance to public events, see Newman, Parades and Politics, 66–67, 85–86; Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 82, 168–71, 233–35; Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 139–41; and Kann, A Republic of Men, 27. For examples of toasts regarding women, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1809, July 18, 1809, July 21, 1812, and August 3, 1813; and Louisville Public Advertiser, May 18, 1825. [ 166 ]

no t es t o pages 42 – 4 4 60. Newman, Parades and Politics, 81, 103; Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes, 72; and Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 145–52. The percentage of African Americans in Kentucky’s population ranged from a low of 17.6 percent in 1790 (the first year for which records are available) to a high of 24.7 percent in 1830; U.S. Department of Commerce, Historical Statistics of the United States, 1:28. On the participation of free blacks in celebrations, see Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 243–45; and Newman, Parades and Politics, 103. 61. Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 71, 107; Duncan, Communication and Social Order, 264, 279, 285. 62. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 28 and August 4, 1826; Russellville Western Messenger, August 12, 18, and 26, 1826. For an account of the Philadelphia militia and their participation in funeral processions, see Davis, Parades and Power, 67. Also see Cray, “Commemorating the Prison Ship Dead.” 63. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, January 23, 1800; Lexington Stewart’s Kentucky Herald, January 28, 1800. The Herald also carried accounts of funeral processions for Washington in Alexandria, Virginia, and in Philadelphia, both of which involved extensive participation by the militia; see Lexington Stewart’s Kentucky Herald, January 14 and 18, 1800. For accounts of Lafayette’s processions, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 12, 19, and 26, and August 2, 1834. One example demonstrates the similarity of militia processions in other parts of the nation. In Savannah, Georgia, the militia carried out a procession for Nathanael Greene. The Lexington Independent Gazetteer, January 24, 1804, reported the event: About five o’clock the whole proceeded, the music played the dead march in Saul, and the artillery firing minute guns as it advanced. When the militia reached the vault in to which the body was to be entombed, they opened the right and left, and, resting on the reversed arms, let it pass through. The funeral service being performed, and the corpse deposited, thirteen discharges from the artillery, and three from the musquetry, closed with a solominity suitable to the occasion.

64. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 21, 1816; the Gazette recorded two other military escorts for Kentucky governors: Charles Scott, October 26, 1813, and James Clark, August 29, 1839. 65. Frankfort Commonwealth, August 26 and September 16, 1845; and the Frankfort Kentucky Yeoman, September 18, 1845. 66. For examples of memorial processions, see Mr. William Parker, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 4, 1797, and Lexington Stewart’s Kentucky Herald, March 7, 1797; Capt. William J. Feizer, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 2, 1837; Capt. John Fowler, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 27, 1840; Capt. William Allison,

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no t es t o pages 4 4 – 49 Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 10, 1842; Sgt. Charles C. Nelson, January 14, 1843; and Gen. Leslie Combs’s son, Paris Western Citizen, February 28, 1845, and Frankfort Commonwealth, March 4, 1845. 67. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 23, 1813. 68. Louisville Courier, June 22, 1847; and Paris Western Citizen, July 16, 30, 1847. For further examples of militia receptions for the returning war dead in Bourbon, Franklin, Montgomery, and Shelby counties, see Paris Western Citizen, August 20 and September 3, 1847, and July 28, 1848. For a comparative account of a memorial service for Revolutionary War soldiers in New York City, see Lexington Reporter, July 2, 1818. 69. Russellville Western Messenger, August 12, 1826. 70. United States Chronicle (Providence), June 26, 1788, quoted in Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 98. 71. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 27, 1811. More than an excuse to partake of drink, toasts were indicators of individual or group beliefs, objectives, or ideologies. As such they were also expressions of, or attempts to influence, public opinion. Because newspapers printed toasts, which were then reprinted across the nation, they could initiate debate and, as Simon Newman points out, “make possible the emergence of a common national language of ritual activity”; see Newman, Parades and Politics, 3. For the significance of toasts as markers of public opinion and for the militia’s control of the content and presentation of toasts, see Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 115, 130, 219–25; Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 51–52, 101; Newman, Parades and Politics, 89; and Eysturlid, “ ‘Epaulets and Feathers,’” 308, 313. The role of newspapers in dispersing accounts of celebrations and their accompanying toasts is addressed in Newman, Parades and Politics, 3; and Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 10–13, 139. 72. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1814. 4. Stability and Security in a Time of Transition 1. For a discussion of the militia’s participation in maintaining civil order before and during the American Revolution, see Lee, Crowds and Soldiers, and Higginbotham, “The American Militia.” In the early republic, Malcolm Rohrbough finds that “the functions of the militia were varied: it supervised elections, conducted censuses, apportioned and collected taxes.” See Rohrbough, The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, 117. 2. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 26, 1790; Harry Innes to the Lieutenant of Mason County, May 26, 1790, Harry Innes Papers, uksc; Isaac Shelby’s Execu-

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no t es t o pages 49 – 5 4 tive Journal, November 3, 1794, Governor Isaac Shelby’s Papers, khs; Charles Scott Papers, September 1793, uksc. Maj. Elias Bargee of Green County received similar orders in March 1795 to muster a guard to convey one Robert Cloyd from Lexington to Green County to testify in a felony case; Isaac Shelby’s Daybook, March 13, 1795, Isaac Shelby Papers, uksc. 3. Major Shambaurg to Maj. Gen. Charles Scott, October 12, 1793, Charles Scott Papers, uksc; Greenup’s Executive Journal, August 1808, Governor Christopher Greenup’s Papers, khs. For more on Wilkinson and the Spanish Conspiracy, see Rusche, “Treachery Within the United States Army”; and Harrison, “James Wilkinson.” 4. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 14, 1794; and Capt. Samuel Worthington to Gen. A. W. Dudley, December 8, 1841, Militia Records, kmrrb. The militia also participated in military executions; for example, see Gen. Anthony Wayne’s Field Book, November 29, 1794, khs. 5. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 26, 1789. For Lee’s account of the episode, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 24, 1789. 6. Lexington Stewart’s Kentucky Herald, March 20, 1798. 7. Capt. William Bradford to Gen. A. Dudley, January 16, 1842, and Mayor Thomas Ross to the Colonel of the Lexington Rifles, July 15, 1846, Militia Records, kmrrb. Also see Thomas Bodley to Harry Bodley, July 17, 1846, Militia Records, kmrrb. 8. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 22, 1835. 9. Henry Dearborn to Christopher Greenup, December 20, 1806, Governor Christopher Greenup’s Papers, khs; and Frankfort Western World, December 25, 1806. In May 1807 relations with Spain continued to fester, sufficiently so that Greenup issued a preliminary request for volunteers should negotiations with the Spanish prove unsuccessful. See Russellville Mirror, May 1, 1807; and Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration, Military History, 75. For more on Burr, see Wood, “The Real Treason of Aaron Burr”; Kline, Political Correspondence and Public Papers of Aaron Burr; and Lomask, Aaron Burr. 10. Russellville Mirror, September 5, 1807. See Perkins, Prologue to War, 77–84, for an account of the Chesapeake-Leopard Affair. 11. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 10, 1827; May 16, 1828; and January 19, 1833. 12. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 23, 1798. 13. John Mahon’s History of the Militia and the National Guard discusses the participation of citizen-soldiers in civil disorders throughout the nation’s history.

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no t es t o pages 5 4 – 55 For specific instances, see “Riots” in the book’s index. Paul Gilje also addresses the role of the militia in New York City’s urban unrest during the 1790s. Militiamen could be found on both sides during a riot, either participating in the violence or attempting to restore order; see Gilje, The Road to Mobocracy and Rioting in America. Also see Grimsted, American Mobbing; Coakley, The Role of Federal Military Forces; Cunliffe, Soldiers and Civilians, 90–94; and Luccioni, “Fire and Be Damned.” 14. Genovese, From Rebellion to Revolution. See Wood, Black Majority, on the Stono Rebellion; Edgerton, Gabriel’s Rebellion, on Gabriel Prosser’s attempted revolt; Lofton, Denmark Vesey’s Revolt; Robertson, Denmark Vesey; Edgerton, He Shall Go Out Free; and Oates, The Fires of Jubilee. 15. George Trotter, Jr., to W. W. Worsley, December 3, 1810, Doc. 5cc9, reel 82, Lyman C. Draper Collection on Microfilm, Ser. cc, Kentucky Papers, David Library of the American Revolution; also George Trotter, Jr., to Lexington Justices of the Peace, December 2, 1810, Doc. 8cc14, reel 82, Lyman C. Draper Collection on Microfilm, Ser. cc, Kentucky Papers, David Library of the American Revolution; Isaac Shelby to Capt. Abner R. Wooley, Ordinance Department, September 19, 1816, Isaac Shelby Papers, uksc. Kentucky statutes required the militia “to patrol and visit all negro quarters, and other places suspected of entertaining unlawful assemblies of Slaves.” In practice, however, members of the town watch instead of the militia usually manned slave patrols; see “An Act for regulating the Militia of this Commonwealth,” section 3, chap. 19, 28, Acts Passed by the General Assembly for the Commonwealth of Kentucky (Lexington, 1792), uksc; and Aron, “‘The Poor Men to Starve,’” 186–87. For examples of the militia’s participation in slave patrols, see Hadden, Slave Patrols; Eysturlid, “Understanding South Carolina’s Military Past”; and Rohrbough, The TransAppalachian Frontier, 118. 16. John Cole to Governor William Owsley, August 16, 1845; John Cole to Governor William Owsley, September 1845; J. Quarles, Circuit Judge of the Fifteenth Judicial District for the State of Kentucky, to John Cole, September 1, 1845; all found in William Owsley’s Letter Book, 1844–1848, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. 17. Governor William Owsley to Gen. Peter Dudley, September 7, 1845, and Gen. Peter Dudley to Governor William Owsley, September 8, 1845, William Owsley’s Letter Book, 1844–1848, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. 18. W. H. Caperton et al. to Gen. Peter Dudley, September 8, 1845, and Gen. Peter Dudley to Governor William Owsley, September 8, 1845, William Owsley’s Letter Book, 1844–1848, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs.

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no t es t o pages 55 – 5 6 19. Governor William Owsley to Gen. Peter Dudley, September 9, 1845, and Gen. Peter Dudley to Governor William Owsley, September 11, 1845, William Owsley’s Letter Book, 1844–1848, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs; Frankfort Commonwealth, October 7, 1845. 20. Dudley issued orders to the Richmond militia on September 8, and in his letter of September 17 discussed the militia’s deployment in Manchester. They may have arrived earlier, but it is doubtful. See Gen. Peter Dudley to Governor William Owsley, September 8, 1845, and Dudley to Owsley, September 17, 1845, William Owsley’s Letter Book, 1844–1848, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. For Owsley’s comments on the militia’s performance, see William Owsley’s Executive Journal, January 1, 1846, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. Following the Civil War, the militia continued to respond to outbreaks of domestic violence or disorder. See Mahon, History of the Militia and the National Guard, 108–24; and Reinders, “Militia and Public Order.” For examples of local studies, see Ball, “Militia Posses”; and Turnbaugh, “Ethnicity, Civic Pride, and Commitment.” 21. Rohrbough notes that Louisiana governor William C. C. Claiborne “regarded the militia as one of the most important instruments at his disposal, especially for the maintenance of civil order” in the new Louisiana Territory; Rohrbough, The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, 117. 22. For a discussion of the necessity of social order to economic development on the frontier, see Doyle, The Social Order of a Frontier Community, 398–99. The early republic’s economy continues to be a subject of debate among historians. Most agree that the early nineteenth century was a transitional period, but the nature of that transition remains in dispute. See Sellers, The Market Revolution; and Gilje, “The Rise of Capitalism.” Although historians of Kentucky’s early economy differ on the specifics, they are in accord that an evolution was under way, as burgeoning productivity and access to transportation and additional markets—essential ingredients for continued growth—prepared the state for the market and capitalism. Historians who specifically deal with the frontier economy are Clark, “Rural America and the Transition to Capitalism”; Kulikoff, “The Transition to Capitalism”; and Rohrbough, The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, especially 35–44 and chapter 4. Those who point out the significance of improved transportation systems are Rohrbough, The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, 100; and Brooke, The Heart of the Commonwealth, 309.The recent studies of Kentucky’s early economy are Friend, “‘Work and Be Rich,’”; Waldrep, “Opportunity on the Frontier”; Friend, “Merchants and Markethouses”; Aron, How the West Was Lost; and Perkins, “The Consumer Frontier.”

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no t es t o pages 57 – 5 8 23. “An Act allowing additional pay to the troops enlisted to garrison the BlockHouse on the Wilderness road, and for other purposes,” 1793, chapter 10, 14; and “An Act allowing a certain guard on the wilderness road additional pay,” 1795, Chapter 12, 51; both in Acts Passed by the General Assembly for the Commonwealth of Kentucky (Lexington, 1793 and 1795), uksc. For an example of orders for militiamen serving as guards on the Wilderness Road, see Isaac Shelby’s Daybook, June 1, 1795, Isaac Shelby Papers, uksc. For more on the Wilderness Road, see Eaton, A History of the Old South, 118, 122. The most productive salt work was at Big Bone Lick. Orders to salt works are found in Governor Isaac Shelby’s Memorandum Book, 1792–1794, Governor Isaac Shelby’s Papers, khs. For the history of Kentucky’s salt works, see Clark, “Salt, A Factor in the Settlement of Kentucky.” Rohrbough discusses the importance of salt and iron works for providing essential goods to settlers on the frontier; see Rohrbough, The TransAppalachian Frontier, 38, 104. Friend points out that on the frontier the threat of Indian raids hindered economic growth, and not until the removal of that danger in 1794 with Anthony Wayne’s victory at Fallen Timbers did settlers have complete freedom to pursue economic expansion; see Friend, “Merchants and Markethouses,” 556. 24. John D. Shane interview with George Trumbo, n.d., Doc. 112cc115, reel 84, Lyman C. Draper Collection on Microfilm, Ser. cc, Kentucky Papers, David Library of the American Revolution. For an additional account of an Indian attack on an iron furnace, see the Parry Needham Diary, Doc. 14cc5, reel 85, Lyman C. Draper Collection on Microfilm, Ser. cc, Kentucky Papers, David Library of the American Revolution. For examples of orders issued to the militia to provide protection for iron works, see Walter Beale to Governor Isaac Shelby, April 12, 1793, Isaac Shelby Papers, uksc; and James Winchester to Isaac Shelby, August 25, 1792, Doc. 5u18, reel 62, Lyman C. Draper Collection on Microfilm, Ser. u, Frontier War Papers, David Library of the American Revolution. Additional orders may be found in Governor Isaac Shelby’s Memorandum Book, 1792–1794, Governor Isaac Shelby’s Papers, khs. The iron works at Slate Creek was the most common destination; see Coleman, “Old Kentucky Iron Furnaces.” Militiamen occasionally found themselves with the additional responsibility of building or maintaining roads, another necessity for the region’s economic development. See Orders of Lt. Col. George Trotter, Forty-second Regiment, Kentucky Militia, August 24, 1805, Charles Scott Papers, uksc. 25. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 12, 1794; and Sprague, “Kentucky and the Navigation of the Mississippi.” Rohrbough writes that from 1795 to 1815 the “dominant feature of the economic development of the trans-Appalachian frontier was the Ohio-Missouri-Mississippi river trade axis”; see Rohrbough, The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, 93. For the challenges of importing and exporting

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 5 8 – 61 goods in the Kentucky region, see Friend, “‘Work and Be Rich,’ ” 142–43. Joan Wells Coward describes Kentucky’s response to the Mississippi River treaties; see Coward, Kentucky in the New Republic, 90, 101, 103. For discussion of Jay’s Treaty, see Hammet, “The Jay Treaty;” Combs, The Jay Treaty: Political Battleground; and Bemis, Jay’s Treaty: A Study in Commerce and Diplomacy. For more on the Bourbon County Committee, see chapter 5. 26. France had gained the Louisiana Territory from Spain under the Treaty of San Ildefonso (1800). For more on Pinckney’s Treaty, see Grant, “The Treaty of San Lorenzo and Manifest Destiny.” 27. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, November 22, 1803. 28. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 6, 1800; Lexington Stewart’s Kentucky Herald, March 11, 1800; and Frankfort Palladium, March 13, 1800. 29. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 5, 1811; Aron, “ ‘ The Poor Men to Starve,’” 183. For a more detailed discussion of how organized activism accelerated Kentucky’s participation in the national economy, see Friend, “Merchants and Markethouses,” 573. 30. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 28 and July 30, 1819. Militia officers frequently chaired or served in other leadership positions at political meetings. For example, at the Democratic state convention in 1834 and at a meeting of Mercer and Anderson County Democrats in 1835, every elected officer carried a militia rank of captain or higher; see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, April 16, 1834, and July 25, 1835. 31. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 2, 1820, May 31, 1821, and June 15, 1838. 32. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 5, 1788. 33. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 8, 1806. For additional examples of toasts to the free navigation of the Mississippi River, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 9, 1796; February 28 and July 11, 1798 (2); July 25, 1799; July 10, 1800; July 9, 1802; July 5, 12 (2), and 19, 1803; and July 8, 1806. 34. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 9, 1796, and July 9, 1802; for other examples, see July 11, 1798, July 5 and 19, 1803, July 9, 1805, and February 26, 1811. 35. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 12, 1803; for additional examples, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 10, 1804, July 5, 1806, and February 25, 1812. For the best description of the Jeffersonian political economy in the early republic, see McCoy, The Elusive Republic. 36. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 12, 1806. An identical toast was offered in 1814, except “the salvation of Kentucky” replaced “the salvation of Columbia”; see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 18, 1814.

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 61– 6 3 37. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 18, 1809. 38. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1809. For additional toasts promoting government assistance to agriculture, manufacturing, and commerce, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 10, 1810, and July 13, 1813. 39. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 7 and 21, 1812. 40. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 6, 1820. For additional examples, see March 4, 1816; July 13, 1820, July 12, 1824; July 21, 1826; February 23, 1827; and July 12, 1838. 41. Robert McAfee’s Journal, June 11 and 25, 1808, Robert Breckenridge McAfee’s Papers, uksc. See Waldrep, “Opportunity on the Frontier,” 157–58, for a discussion of the informality of economic exchanges in early Kentucky. Also see Rohrbough, The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, 30. Perkins points out that militia service also brought the reward of pay and occasionally plunder; Perkins, Border Life, 124. 42. Acts Passed at the First Session of the Nineteenth General Assembly for the Commonwealth of Kentucky (Frankfort, 1811), 119, uksc. A poem appeared in Lexington Kentucky Gazette, April 24, 1810, that was critical of tax assessments and use of the militia muster as a place for collection. The anonymous poet lampooned the men selected from each company to serve as tax assessor: The following oath each man must take, Before that he can progress make: “Upon my oath, I, AB, ab, Do here affirm, that I will nab Each he or she, that comes to muster, Or else I’ll make a desp’rate bluster.” He’ll hold his court on muster days When men shall come from different ways And women too with mighty rumpuss, Flocking from all points of the compass.

43. Isaac Shelby’s Daybook, June 1, 1795, Isaac Shelby Papers, uksc; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 1, 1833; James Winchester Logbook, November 2, 1812, uksc; and Charles Scott Journal (1793–1794), October 10, 1794, fchs. The Mounted Volunteers from Kentucky who served under Maj. Gen. Charles Scott in 1794 recorded expenditures for “complete rations,” which included meat, bread, salt, flour, soap, and candles. These articles amounted to $24,336.22. Add in the ever-present whiskey allotments, purchased for another $751.99, and the local economy received a $25,088.21 boost; Military Correspondence, James Young Love Papers, fchs. [ 174 ]

no t es t o pages 63 – 67 44. Receipt issued by John B. Tilford, 1842; also see receipts and bills of lading for shipment of arms from Louisville to Frankfort totaling $550.00; May 1848, Militia Records, kmrrb. A. R. Crosby to unknown, April 1847, Militia Records, kmrrb. Allan Kulikoff discusses the competition in Virginia to gain military contract in “The Transition to Capitalism,” 137. 45. Lexington Stewart’s Kentucky Herald, March 27, 1798; Account of the Lexington Troop of Cavalry, 1807, Charles Scott Papers, uksc; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 17, 1793. 46. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 27, 1827, and May 11, 1813. For examples of similar advertisements, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 18, 1797; August 21, 1818 (reprinted August 28); July 9, 1819 (reprinted July 16, 22, and 30); and March 24, 1820 (reprinted April 7, 14, 21, and 28). For the description of Bullock’s regiment, see Bardstown Candid Review, September 8, 1807. Elizabeth Perkins explains that such consumerism “encouraged competitive display” and “facilitated social integration, linking people in a fraternity of shared values”; Perkins, “The Consumer Frontier,” 509. 47. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 9, 1815 (reprinted January 11, March 4, and June 24, 1816); Frankfort Palladium, November 7, 1799; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, April 27, 1813. 48. Most of the itinerant military instructors and their advertisements appeared during the five-year period from 1809 to 1816: Joseph Ellerback, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 21, 1809; John R. Shaw, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, April 4, 1809; John Cipriani, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 25 and June 15, 1813; Maj. R. I. Dunn, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 25, August 1 and 16, October 23, and November 14, 1814, December 8, 15, and 22, 1830, August 31, September 7, 21, and 28, and October 5 and 12, 1833, October 8, 15, and 29, 1840, and April 23, 1842; Major Chevis, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 9, 1816; and “Military Music School,” Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 16, 23, and 30, 1816. 49. Brooke, The Heart of the Commonwealth, 307–8. 50. Quoted in Aron, “‘The Poor Men to Starve,’” 178. 51. Doyle, The Social Order of a Frontier Community, 3. 5. Proponents of Democracy and Partisanship 1. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 31, 1810. 2. Formisano, “Deferential-Participant Politics”; Rohrbough, The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, 348–49.

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no t es t o pages 6 8 – 73 3. Rohrbough discusses the evolving political environment west of the Appalachian Mountains in The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, 379. Elizabeth Perkins points out that on the frontier the battle to define social and political structures occurred in two arenas, the fortified posts like Bryant’s Station and within militia companies; see Perkins, Border Life, 121–22. 4. R. Claire Snyder observes that historians have focused on the militia’s military deficiencies, “missing the important political role played by martial rituals”; Snyder, Citizen-Soldiers and Manly Warriors, 86. 5. State Bar Association of Kentucky, “Journal of the First Constitutional Convention,” x. 6. For the history of Kentucky’s pre-statehood years, see Watlington, The Partisan Spirit; and Harrison, Kentucky’s Road to Statehood. For an account of the 1792 and 1799 Kentucky constitutional conventions, see Coward, Kentucky in the New Republic. 7. Watlington, The Partisan Spirit, 113–14. 8. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 27, 1788. 9. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 27, 1788. 10. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 18, 1788. 11. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 18, 1788. Both “Brutus,” writing in the Gazette, and Humphrey Marshall, in his history of Kentucky, labeled the militiamen’s instructions as “moderate.” As one would expect, opponents of separation thought the measures too extreme. Marshall, The History of Kentucky, I:298; and Watlington, The Partisan Spirit, 172–73. 12. Evidence does not reveal the outcome of this meeting or indeed if representatives ever met. However, inclement weather forced the Fayette County committee to reschedule a late October meeting; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 8, 29, 1791. 13. Henry offered his ideas in a two-part essay that appeared in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 15 and 22, 1791. See also Coward, Kentucky in the New Republic, 16; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, December 24, 1791. 14. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 15 and 22, 1791, and February 11, 1792. 15. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 3, 1792. 16. Coward, Kentucky in the New Republic, 20–21, 30–31; Perkins, Border Life, 148; and Article 3, section 1, in State Bar Association of Kentucky, “Journal of the First Constitutional Convention,” 15. Debate continues over whether the wording of the Constitution included free blacks. The clause pertaining to

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no t es t o pages 73 – 76 suffrage reads: “In elections by the citizens, all free male citizens of the age of twenty-one years . . . shall enjoy the rights of an elector,” not specifying any racial restrictions. There is not a consensus among historians on this apparent oversight by the framers. Harrison maintains that the use of the term “citizens” automatically disqualified blacks from participating at the polls. Coward, on the other hand, notes that the delegates had granted “suffrage to all free men, by intent or accident including free blacks,” an ambiguity eliminated at the 1799 convention that revised the original constitution; Harrison, Kentucky’s Road to Statehood, 122; and Coward, Kentucky in the New Republic, 138. For an analysis of the constitutional and philosophical debates that preceded the 1792 convention, especially the influence of George Nicholas, see Laver, “ ‘ Chimney Corner Constitutions.’ ” 17. While John Brooke identifies fraternal and voluntary societies as important vehicles for political expression, he does not include in his analysis the militia; Brooke, “Ancient Lodges and Self-Created Societies,” especially 289 and 316. 18. Coward, Kentucky in the New Republic, 45–47. 19. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 4 and 11, 1794; Frankfort Palladium, June 20, 1799, “Somebrious” quotation; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 19, 1798, “Citizen” quotation; and Frankfort Palladium, March 21 and June 20, 1799. Fayette County residents also proposed a militia-based process for selecting delegates to the convention; see Lexington Stewart’s Kentucky Herald, January 30, 1799. The best analysis of the militia’s significance in relation to standing armies and republican ideology is Cress, Citizens in Arms. 20. Coward, Kentucky in the New Republic, 115–18. 21. Rohrbough, The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, 30; Perkins, Border Life, 148; Bardstown Candid Review, June 20, 1809; and Paris Western Citizen, June 22, 1838. The Clay story is recounted in Perkins, Border Life, 148–49; for additional examples, see Frankfort Guardian of Freedom, March 30, 1803, and Russellville Weekly Messenger, October 28, 1826. In his study of South Carolina politics, Lee Eysturlid observes that “it was the obligatory militia muster, therefore, that provided the means of assembling the voting part of the population on several occasions every year. . . . The muster remained a prime ground for political debate throughout the 1840s and the post–Mexican War crisis in the Union”; Eysturlid, “ ‘ Epaulets and Feathers,’” 308–9, 311. On the popularization and democratization of politics at celebrations and festivities in general, see Newman, Parades and Politics, 7, and Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 180. 22. Lexington Stewart’s Kentucky Herald, September 11, 1798; Louisville Public Advertiser, June 18 and 25, 1825; and Russellville Weekly Messenger, July 19, 1825. For accounts of additional musters at which speakers debated the issue, see Lou[ 177 ]

no t es t o pages 76 – 8 0 isville Public Advertiser, June 15 and 22, 1825. Essays commenting on the debate appear in Louisville Public Advertiser, June 22 and July 2, 1825. Coward discusses the court reform controversy in Kentucky in the New Republic, 158–59. 23. Alex Dromgoole to Governor Isaac Shelby, January 29, 1794, Isaac Shelby Papers, uksc. 24. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 21, 1812. 25. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 1, 1816. 26. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 1, 1816. 27. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 15, 1816. Pope had a lengthy political career, first representing Shelby County in the state legislature in 1802 and Fayette County in 1806. He occupied a seat in the U.S. Senate from 1807 to 1813, and served as the governor of the Arkansas Territory from 1829 to 1835, as an appointee of Andrew Jackson. The Biographical Encyclopaedia of Kentucky, 207. 28. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 15, 1816; Skeen, “Vox Populi, Vox Dei,” 256–58. 29. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 22, 1816. 30. Skeen, “Vox Populi, Vox Dei,” 253–74. 31. Coward, Kentucky in the New Republic, 10–11, 23–24; Harrison, Kentucky’s Road to Statehood, 44. Interpretative as well as primary materials can be found in Speed, The Political Club. Making a similar point, John Brooke notes the necessity of a preexisting network of communications for the success of any movement or interest group. As one example, he describes freemasonry as a “vehicle for the closed circle of elite southern politics in the 1790s”; Brooke, “Ancient Lodges and Self-Created Societies,” 7–8, 329. Also see Brooke, The Heart of the Commonwealth, 245–47. 32. Steven Rosswurm’s Arms, Country, and Class, offers the best available analysis of the political activism of a militia organization. He traces the influence of militia companies on Philadelphia politics during the Revolution, finding that “the Philadelphia lower sort transformed and politicized the militia and made it, among other things, the institutional embodiment of their growing power” (252). Other historians have considered the political implications of militia activities; see Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 184–85; Newman, Parades and Politics, 111–19, 188; and Davis, Parades and Power, 49–72. 33. Lexington Stewart’s Kentucky Herald, April 7, 1801; Frankfort Palladium, March 10, 1801; and Lexington Stewart’s Kentucky Herald, July 21, 1801. Waldstreicher describes the electioneering and campaign meetings that marked the 1800 election; Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 182. Newman recounts

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no t es t o pages 8 0 – 82 militia companies’ expressions of support for John Adams in 1798; Newman, Parades and Politics, 76. 34. Kentuckians read of Adams victory parades, including an account of a celebration in Boston when “about one o’clock on Sunday night, . . . a salute of one hundred guns was immediately fired”; Louisville Public Advertiser, March 19, 1825. 35. Brooke describes the shifting political role of voluntary societies from “a critical center of gravity” in the late eighteenth century to “a secondary position” following the 1800 election; Brooke, “Ancient Lodges and Self-Created Societies,” 324–25. See also Brooke, The Heart of the Commonwealth, 248; Rohrbough, The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, 390–91; and Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 215– 16. In eastern states, party-associated militia activity was a common occurrence dating to the constitutional debates. Waldstreicher details encounters between Federalist and anti-Federalist companies in Albany (1788), pro-Adams and antiAdams units in Philadelphia (1797), and Republican militia parades in Philadelphia (1800); Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 99, 158, 185, 195. For additional examples, see Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 98, 100–101, 159; and Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes, 157. 36. Ford, Origins of Southern Radicalism, 303–4; Snyder, Citizen-Soldiers and Manly Warriors, 87–88; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 24, 1823; and Russellville Weekly Messenger, October 23, 1824. See also an address to Andrew Jackson by a battalion of New Orleans militia companies and Jackson’s response; Louisville Public Advertiser, July 14, 1824. A number of studies demonstrate the significance of celebrations and militia musters to partisan activities in the early republic; Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 187; Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 226–27; and Newman, Parades and Politics, chapter 3. 37. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 15, 1827, and July 27 and September 14, 1827. 38. For examples of toasts to Clay, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1809; July 1, 1810; July 7, 1812; July 16, 1819; February 25, July 6, and July 13, 1820; August 7, 1823; August 12, 1824; and February 24 and July 21, 1826. For examples of toasts to Jackson, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 28 and July 11, 1814; July 5, 1817; February 25, 1820; July 17, 1823; August 12, 1824; and July 21, 1826. For toasts to internal improvements, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 25, July 6, and July 13, 1820; February 27, July 17, and August 7, 1823; July 21 1826; February 23, 1827; and July 12, 1838. For toasts to protective tariffs, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 13, 1820, and August 12, 1824. 39. Russellville Weekly Messenger, October 9, 1824; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 6, 1827. For accounts of similar polling at musters in other states, see Rus[ 17 9 ]

no t es t o pages 82 – 8 6 sellville Weekly Messenger, May 17, 1823; Louisville Public Advertiser, May 29, June 26, and October 9, 1824 (Indiana); Louisville Public Advertiser, October 6 and 24, 1824 (Ohio); Louisville Public Advertiser, July 21, October 27, 1824 (Alabama); and Louisville Public Advertiser, August 25, 1824 (North Carolina). 40. Frankfort Argus of Western America, March 11, 1829; Russellville Weekly Messenger, December 5, 1828. As returns from the 1834 congressional elections made their way to Kentucky, the militia turned out again, firing salutes to Democratic victories in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Ohio; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, November 22 and 29, 1834. 41. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 23, 1827. In Parades and Politics, Newman recounts the displeasure of “A Militia Man” at the partisan nature of a February 22, 1794, celebration and the militia who were being “‘converted into a pretorian band, to offer up incense of adulation to the first servant of the people’” (62). 42. Louisville Public Advertiser, July 21, 1824; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1835; and Paris Western Citizen, July 3 and 10, 1840. For additional examples of Kentuckians’ concerns with the excesses, political and otherwise, of holiday celebrations, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 19, 1823, and October 21, 1829. 43. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 28, 1834. Eysturlid finds that South Carolina witnessed a similar voice of opposition to political militias, but as in Kentucky, the majority drowned out what amounted to a whisper of protest. Eysturlid, “ ‘ Epaulets and Feathers,’” 309. 44. Paris Western Citizen, March 20, 1840; April 10 and 17, and May 29, 1840. See also “A. Beatty” to “The Whigs of Mason County,” Paris Western Citizen, May 31, 1839. For a similar call to political arms, see Paris Western Citizen, March 27, 1840. An editorial in the May 29, 1840, issue of the Paris Western Citizen encouraged the formation of similar clubs “from the bounds of every militia company in old Bourbon.” For a description of the militia’s centrality to a Whig rally in Shelbyville, Tennessee, see Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes, 76–77. 45. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, November 26, 1840. 46. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 2 and 10, 1844. Early in the 1844 presidential campaign, accounts of rallies and barbecues did not record militia participation; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 13, 20, and 27, 1844. There is no way to know with certainty that the militia did not participate in these meetings, but without direct evidence of their presence, I have assumed they did not attend as a unit. For descriptions of the Hickories’ visits to other towns, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 17, October 5, 12, 19, and 26, and November 9, 1844. 47. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 21, November 9, and November 23, 1844.

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 8 7 – 91 48. Susan Davis briefly discusses the political advantages a man could obtain from militia service, likening companies to “private men’s clubs and businessmen’s associations.” According to Davis, such organizations provided “access to the sources and exercise of public power”; Davis, Parades and Power, 56–57. 49. Louisville Public Advertiser, June 16, 1824, April 6, 1825, and May 23, 1823; Russellville Weekly Messenger, October 23, 1824; Schlesinger, The Age of Jackson, 38. 50. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 6 and August 28, 1828. 51. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 10, 1835. John O’Fallon, an officer who served under Harrison in the War of 1812, wrote a number of letters defending his commander’s prior record; O’Fallon to William Henry Harrison, April 21, 1834, file 4, and O’Fallon to Moses B. Corwin, February 26, 1840, file 6, both in the John O’Fallon Papers, 1809–1850, fchs. 52. Of the twelve men who had served in the militia before becoming governor, two had achieved the rank of general, four the rank of colonel, and two the rank of captain. In addition, two served as aid-de-camps, one as judge advocate, and one in an unknown capacity. For biographical information on Kentucky’s governors, see Harrison, Kentucky’s Governors; and Powell, Kentucky Governors. 53. For accounts of Shelby’s participation in the War of 1812, see Stone, A Brittle Sword, 40–51; and Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration, Military History, 84–92. Perkins also points out that “a third of [Kentucky’s] early magistrates were militia officers.” See Perkins, Border Life, 146. 54. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 27, 1800. 55. Lexington Stewart’s Kentucky Herald, October 14, October 28, and November 11, 1800; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 28, 1808, and August 29, 1809. 56. Frankfort Guardian of Freedom, January 19, 1803; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 23, 1804; Paris Western Citizen, June 14, 1839. For additional examples, Robert Sanders’s campaign for Scott County elector, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 3, 1804; Maj. P. Morehead’s campaign for state Senate, Russellville Western Messenger, July 27, 1822; and Col. Richard Taylor’s campaign for state office, Louisville Public Advertiser, June 25, 1825. 57. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 12, 1812; and National Intelligencer reprinted in Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 14, 1812. For other examples of letters supporting Shelby and citing his military career, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 19 and June 9, 1812. 58. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 21, 1812. Slaughter would serve in the War of 1812, most notably seeing action at the Battle of New Orleans in 1815. He later ran a successful campaign for the governorship of Kentucky, succeeding Shelby

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 91– 9 3 and serving from 1816 to 1820. See Harrison, Kentucky’s Governors, 1–6, 19–23; and Powell, Kentucky Governors, 14–15, 24–25. Shelby was not the only candidate to attract the critic’s barb for his martial ties. One writer to the Gazette criticized the propensity of DeWitt Clinton’s electoral candidates to appropriate titles for themselves, particularly one who “announces himself as a General officer.” Only one of Clinton’s candidates had “not shewn the same fondness for such gewgaws”; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, November 13, 1812. The race for presidential electors in 1812 induced recollections of past battles. Supporters announced the candidacy of militia major Walker Baylor in September, describing him as “one of the sons of ’76 to which principles he has uniformly adhered”; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 15, 1812. 59. The four candidates were Gen. John Adair, Col. Anthony Butler, Gen. Joseph Desha, and William Logan; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 3, 1820. 60. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 11, 1820; Russellville Weekly Messenger, March 14, 1820; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, December 17, 1819. The Gazette received and printed a large number of letters supporting Adair, frequently citing his experience as a militia officer and his war record as proof of his qualifications to lead Kentucky as governor; see, for example, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 2, June 9, and July 13, 1820; and Russellville Weekly Messenger, July 22, 1820. 61. For accounts of the Kentuckians’ performance at New Orleans, see Stone, A Brittle Sword, 50–51; Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration, Military History, 96–97; and Hickey, The War of 1812, 206–14. The Court of Inquiry that reviewed the Kentuckians’ performance at New Orleans exonerated the militiamen for their retreat, citing a lack of adequate weapons and improper placement in the line of battle by non-Kentucky officers; see Copy of the Court of Inquiry’s Findings, February 9, 1815, Doc. 8cc20, reel 83, Lyman C. Draper Collection on Microfilm, Ser. cc, Kentucky Papers, David Library of the American Revolution. 62. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 2 and 22, 1820; also see the essay by “Regulus,” Russellville Weekly Messenger, June 10, 1820. 63. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 2 and 29, 1820. For a similar interpretation of Adair’s military record, see “Aristides’s” letter in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 9, 1820. “Curtius” was even less generous, maintaining that “no evidence of [Adair’s] chivalric spirit has ever been exhibited”; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 3, 1820. An obituary published in May 1840 attributed Adair’s election victory to his firm defense of his troops’ performance at the Battle of New Orleans. “The Kentuckians,” the story ran, “elected Adair governor mainly on the ground of his defense of their troops”; Doc. 19cc23–24, reel 86, Lyman C.

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no t es t o pages 93 – 95 Draper Collection on Microfilm, Ser. cc, Kentucky Papers, David Library of the American Revolution. 64. The 1824 election did prompt some debate over military records when Gen. William Russell ran against Gen. Joseph Desha. In this campaign, however, most letters and editorials promoted the qualities and character of their favorite, citing his military performance as evidence of leadership ability. Rarely were essays as critical or as vituperative as those of the 1820 election. For examples, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 12, 1823, February 12 and 15, 1824, and July 29, 1824. 65. For accounts of the battle, see Hickey, The War of 1812, 40–41; Stone, A Brittle Sword, 49–50; and Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration, Military History, 92–94. A biographical sketch of Johnson is included in Malone, The Dictionary of American Biography, 114–16. 66. The original article appeared in the Louisville Journal, September 3, 1834. It was later quoted in Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 20, 1834. For an editorial critical of Johnson’s military career, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, November 26, 1843. 67. Kentuckian, A Biographical Sketch of Col. Richard M. Johnson, 35; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, April 2, 1842. 68. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 2 and 8, 1840, and April 9, 1842. 69. “Contrast of the Military Character and Services of Gen. William Henry Harrison, and Col. Richard M. Johnson,” Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 5, 1840. 70. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 5, 1825, and December 28, 1827. In Kentucky’s 1824 presidential election, nine of fourteen candidates for Jacksonian elector were officers; Louisville Public Advertiser, October 16, 1824. Campaign announcements, articles, letters, and editorials abound that make reference to candidates’ military careers or lack thereof. Most emphasized the aspiring politician’s martial record, while occasionally a writer attacked an opponent’s supposedly inferior performance in arms. For example, a defense of Maj. Matthew Flournoy’s record during the Indian wars concluded with the demand, “Tell us in what war your nominee for Governor served or fought in!”; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 19, 1836. See also “A Citizen’s” letter supporting Gen. John M. McCalla’s 1843 bid for the state legislature, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 8, 1843; and Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor, 419. 71. Paris Western Citizen, April 23, 1831. 72. Paris Western Citizen, April 30, 1831.

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 9 6 –10 0 73. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 23, 1828. 74. Kann, A Republic of Men, 131–34; Kann, The Gendering of American Politics, 134; and Rohrbough, The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, 117, 380, 386–87. Nicole Etcheson makes the same points in “Manliness and the Political Culture of the Old Northwest” (63). A number of studies show the relationship between militia experience and electoral success; Eysturlid, “‘Epaulets and Feathers,’ ” 313; and Eubank, “A Time for Heroes.” 6. A Refuge of Manhood 1. The meanings of “republican” and “liberal” are explored in the historiographical debate over the political ideology of the colonial and Revolutionary eras; see Rodgers, “Republicanism: The Career of a Concept.” Rotundo uses the label “communal” to characterize masculinity in the eighteenth century and “self-made” to describe constructs of masculinity in the nineteenth century; see Rotundo, American Manhood, 10–25. Also see Kann, A Republic of Men, 1–51, 109; and Kimmel, Manhood in America, 18. 2. Rotundo, American Manhood, 1–7; and Bloch, “The Gendered Meanings of Virtue,” 42. Hanna Pitkin reminds us that the word virtue “derives from the Latin virtus, and thus from vir, which means ‘man.’ Virtu is thus manliness, those qualities found in a ‘real man,’” the essence of being a man. See Pitkin, Fortune Is a Woman, 25. See also Wood, The Creation of the American Republic, 53, 68; Kann, A Republic of Men, 107; and Greene, “The Concept of Virtue.” 3. Ward, Andrew Jackson, 169; and Rotundo, American Manhood, 18–20. Also see Pugh, Sons of Liberty, 12, 24–26; Bloch, “The Gendered Meanings of Virtue,” 56; Kimmel, Manhood in America, 29; and Connell, Masculinities, 191. For an analysis of the development of a virtuous work ethic, see Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. A comprehensive study of the transition from barter to market is found in Sellers, The Market Revolution. 4. Rotundo, American Manhood, 19–20; Bloch, “The Gendered Meanings of Virtue,” 56; Kann, A Republic of Men, 14, 159; Kimmel, Manhood in America, 22–23, 26; and Alsop, “Stout-hearted Men.” 5. Rotundo, American Manhood, 16; Kann, A Republic of Men, 8–11, 96, 100; and Pugh, Sons of Liberty, 4. 6. Kimmel, Manhood in America, 59; also see 43–45, 78. See also Stearns, Be A Man!, 7; Kann, A Republic of Men, 2, 22, 15, 51, 109; Pugh, Sons of Liberty, 6; and Sellers, The Market Revolution, 246. 7. Gen. Robert H. Barrow, quoted in Hartsock, “Masculinity, Heroism, and the Making of War,” 134. At the time, General Barrow was the commandant of the

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 10 0 –10 4 U.S. Marines; Stearns, Be A Man!, 3, 23–25. David Gilmore writes in Manhood in the Making, “There is no society I am aware of in which women are principally, or even occasionally warriors” (121). See also Goldstein, War and Gender, 9–22, 265; and Snyder, Citizen-Soldiers and Manly Warriors, 1. Male gender construction in the Victorian period, an era that has received particular attention from historians of gender identity, further supports the close connection between maleness and the military. Donald Mrozak maintains that militaristic institutions of the late nineteenth century defined “a distinctive sphere of male virtues” where service became not only a social obligation but also a right of passage for young men; Mrozak, “The Habit of Victory,” 220–22. This relationship reached beyond the United States to other western countries. See Gilmore, Manhood in the Making; and Moss, “Manliness and Militarism.” 8. Ricardo Adolfo Herrera demonstrates that the association of manhood and the military occurred throughout the United States; Herrera, “Guarantors of Liberty and the Republic.” The men who fought in the Continental Army or served in the truncated United States Army following the Revolution surely felt a similar confirmation of their masculinity, but the nature of these institutions limited the number of men involved. The militia, on the other hand, operated in nearly every town, village, and crossroads throughout the country, giving most men between the ages of eighteen and forty-five the opportunity to experience, at least part-time, a soldier’s life. 9. Capt. Robert F. Pullman to Governor William Owsley, June 1, 1846, William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. 10. Mrozak, “The Habit of Victory,” 234; Kann, A Republic of Men, 1, 30–51; Snyder, Citizen-Soldiers and Manly Warriors, 19, 6, 1–78; and Goldstein, War and Gender, 266. 11. Greene, “The Concept of Virtue,” 218. George Mosse discusses Guts Muth in The Image of Man, 41–42, 48. See also Rotundo, American Manhood, 13–14, 21. 12. Mark Kann discusses Locke’s thoughts on the militia and self-discipline in On the Man Question, 180. See also Calhoun, “Report on the Causes and Reasons for War”; Clay, “Newspaper Editorial,” April 4, 1812; Hopkins, The Papers of Henry Clay, 647; Mitchell, “Soldiering, Manhood, and Coming of Age,” 48; and Kann, A Republic of Men, 21, 31, 160. 13. Adj. Gen. A. H. Holmes, Kentucky Militia, August 8, 1813, War of 1812 Muster Roll and General Orders, khs; and James Winchester Logbook, August 27, 1812, uksc. St. Clair’s comments appear in Lexington Kentucky Gazette, December 10, 1791.

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 10 4 –10 8 14. A. H. Caldwell to William Owsley, n.d.; James O. Ballin to William Owsley, October 26, 1847; and R. Johnson to William Owsley, May 24, 1846; all in William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. For additional discussion of the masculine and military virtues of self-discipline, see Mitchell, “Soldiering, Manhood, and Coming of Age,” 46; and Watts, The Republic Reborn, 270. 15. Rotundo, American Manhood, 12–13; Kann, On the Man Question, 91, 187; and Eubank, “A Time for Heroes,” 176. 16. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, January 12, 1813, October 17, 1814, and August 10, 1813. Civil War soldiers maintained a similar association between duty and their manhood. One officer explained to his wife, “My manhood is involved in a faithful and fearless sticking to the job until it is finished, or it finishes me.” See McPherson, For Cause and Comrades, 137. 17. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 2, 1814, and October 20, 1812; and Shelby Stone to William Owsley, May 30, 1846, in William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. 18. Tocqueville, Democracy in America, 105, 103; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, November 29, 1803; and Regimental Orders, December 21, 1808, Kentucky Militia File, khs. 19. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, December 22, 1812. See also Address to the Militia, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 31, 1813; and Isaac Shelby to William Henry Harrison, August 11, 1813, Isaac Shelby Papers, uksc. 20. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 17 and 24, 1813, and October 17, 1814. 21. Secretary of War W. L. Marcy to William Owsley, August 28, 1845, and W. L. Marcy to Majors Morehead, Letcher, and Dudley, June 2, 1846, William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs; and Governor Owsley’s annual message to the Legislature, January 1, 1848, William Owsley’s Executive Journal, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. 22. Wyatt-Brown, Honor and Violence in the Old South, vii; Gen. Green Clay, General Orders, July 31, 1813, War of 1812 Muster Roll and General Orders, khs; and Gen. Green Clay, General Orders, August 26, 1813, in Gen. Green Clay’s Order Book, uksc. 23. Letter from Colonel Duane, Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 13, 1814; Kentuckian, A Biographical Sketch of Col. Richard M. Johnson, 6; and Col. M. H. Webb to William Owsley, May 20, 1846, William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. For an additional example, see Col. Robert E. Glenn to Owsley, May 22, 1846, William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. For analysis of honor in the Mexican War, see [ 186 ]

n o t e s t o p a g e s 10 9 –110 Eubank, “A Time for Heroes.” Honor continued to influence soldiers during the Civil War, as one father demonstrated in a letter home, writing that he “would rather die an honorable Death than to Bring Reproach or Dishonor upon my family or friends”; McPherson, For Cause and Comrades, 138. 24. W. G. Bullock to William Owsley, May 27, 1846; Brig. Gen. W. Lipscomb to William Owsley, May 25, 1846; Edward D. Hobbes to William Owsley, May 23, 1846; James O. Ballin to William Owsley, October 26, 1847; and Col. Robert E. Glenn to William Owsley, May 26, 1846. All letters may be found in William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. For more on the significance of the term “gentleman,” see Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor, 88–91, and Nicole Etcheson, “Manliness and the Political Culture of the Old Northwest,” 70–73. 25. A. H. Caldwell to William Owsley, n.d.; James O’Bannon, Second Lieutenant, to William Owsley, May 26, 1846; Alexander Miller to William Owsley, May 23, 1846; all in William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. See also John J. Crittenden to Isaac Shelby, December 17, 1820, Isaac Shelby Papers, uksc. In 1806 one James Goodwin did indeed see a connection between money and status when he praised a Major Graves in a letter to Governor Christopher Greenup: “He is in every way worthy . . . as a Gentleman, Soldier, and Man of Property.” James C. Goodwin to Governor Christopher Greenup, August 3, 1806, Militia Records, kmrrb. 26. Stearns, Be A Man!, 30, 19; and Kann, On the Man Question, 276. Also see Etcheson, “Manliness and the Political Culture of the Old Northwest,” 63; Snyder, Citizen-Soldiers and Manly Warriors, 8, 23; and Dubbert, A Man’s Place, 32–34. 27. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, May 21, 1791, and May 18 and November 1, 1813. For more on the Battle of the River Raisin and the Battle of the Thames, see Hickey, The War of 1812, 85–86, 137–39. 28. Nelson describes the emergence of a white male identity in the early republic in National Manhood. See also Oakes, The Ruling Race, 41, 83–86, 138–42; WyattBrown, Southern Honor, 39, 63–69, 157; Franklin, The Militant South, 63–66; Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 86–87, 153; and Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes, 75, 80–81. 29. James W. Allen to Quartermaster General John Woods, August 20, 1834, Militia Records, kmrrb; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 11, 1835. Bertram Wyatt-Brown and John Hope Franklin both note the importance of militia events to engendering a white male identity across class lines as well as to creating community unity; see Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor, 340–41; and Franklin, The Militant South, 173–85. For national accounts of the relationship among pub[ 187 ]

n o t e s t o p a g e s 111–112 lic events, white male unity, and a community identity, see Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 105, 242–43; Newman, Parades and Politics, 103; Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 184–85; Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes; Doyle, The Social Order of a Frontier Community; and Duncan, Communication and Social Order, 275. The practice of officer elections further strengthened the fraternal bonds within militia companies. By tradition and statute, the rank and file elected company officers; see Acts Passed at the Second Session of the First General Assembly for the Commonwealth of Kentucky (Lexington, 1792), 6, uksc. This practice changed in 1799 when new legislation gave field officers and captains the power to nominate company commissioned officers for approval by the governor; see Acts of the General Assembly (Lexington, 1799), 8–9. 30. The close relationship among militia officers and community officials, who were often one in the same, was common. See Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor, 69; Kutolowski and Kutolowski, “Commissions and Canvasses”; and Rohrbough, The Trans-Appalachian Frontier, 7, 116–17. For the relationship between control of public ceremonies and speeches and the concomitant access to power, see WyattBrown, Southern Honor, 47, 330; Franklin, The Militant South, 189–92; Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 225; Davis, Parades and Power, 70–71; and Duncan, Communication and Social Order, 264. Cynthia Kierner demonstrates how restrictions on speakers reinforced southern social order; Kierner, “Genteel Balls and Republican Parades,” 198. For a discussion of the role of audiences in rituals and community events, see Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 71–72; and Duncan, Communication and Social Order, 262. 31. Nelson, National Manhood, ix–x; Kann, A Republic of Men, 17, 26, 153–54; and Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor, 138–40, 170–71, 251. 32. Kierner presents an insightful analysis of the role and significance of southern women at celebrations; Kierner, “Genteel Balls and Republican Parades,” 195–204. Also see Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor, 43, 51–52, 234, 347–48. For a discussion of women and the concept of dependency in the Revolutionary era, see Gundersen, “Independence, Citizenship, and the American Revolution.” For additional interpretations of women’s participation in, exclusion from, and significance to public events, see Goldstein, War and Gender, 301–22; Newman, Parades and Politics, 66–67, 85–86; Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 82, 168–71, 233–35; and Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 139–41. 33. Doubler, Civilian in Peace, Soldier in War, 18–22; and U.S. Congress, The Militia Act of 1792. See also Acts Passed at the Second Session of the First General Assembly for the Commonwealth of Kentucky (Lexington, 1792), 28, uksc. For additional examples with the same wording, see Acts of the General Assembly (Lexington, 1798), 91; and Acts of the General Assembly (Lexington, 1801), 142. See also Trav-

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 113 –115 ers, Celebrating the Fourth, 145–52; Newman, Parades and Politics, 81, 103; and Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes, 72. 34. Kimmel, Manhood in America, 18; Kann, A Republic of Men, 28–29, 52, 73, 76– 77, 105; Kann, On the Man Question, 273. 35. Nelson, National Manhood, 184–87; Snyder, Citizen-Soldiers and Manly Warriors, 35; and Kann, A Republic of Men, 28, 155, 160. 36. Franklin, The Militant South, 14–62. Hundley, Social Relations in Our Southern States, 199. Wyatt-Brown notes the promotion of gun use among young boys in the South in Southern Honor, 156. Also see Morgan, American Slavery, American Freedom, 239–40; and Aron, How the West Was Lost, 103, 113. Historian Michael Bellesiles has challenged the pervasiveness of weapons in the early American landscape, arguing that guns hung over very few fireplaces and rarely threatened the squirrel population. Hunting and handling a gun, he maintains, especially in the early nineteenth century, became less a means of survival and more a rite of manly passage. His thesis initiated a firestorm of debate, at times quite heated, among historians and those concerned with the place of guns in American culture. Bellesiles argues that America’s gun culture developed not in the colonial or Revolutionary eras, but in the post–Civil War period when gun manufacturers increased productivity and promotion of their weapons. This challenge to the veracity of an American icon, the well-armed citizen-soldier, has drawn fire from both academics and public interest groups, most notably the National Rifle Association. After intense scrutiny, the validity of his thesis remains unresolved, requiring further research and analysis. My argument does not rely on his findings; however, my research tends to corroborate elements of his work. Specifically, the Kentucky Militia frequently appeared for muster without arms, and as the competition for weapons demonstrated, many citizensoldiers lacked their own weapons. See Bellesiles, Arming America. For a critical review of Arming America as well as a response by Bellesiles, see The William and Mary Quarterly 59 (January 2002): 203–68. 37. Royster, A Revolutionary People at War; General Orders, November 9, 1812, James Winchester Logbook, uksc; Ward, Andrew Jackson, 16, 29. See also Hickey, The War of 1812, for an account of the defense of Baltimore, 202–4; and Remini, The Battle of New Orleans. For a discussion of the Kentucky frontiersmen and their legendary reputations, see Moore, The Frontier Mind, 77–106. 38. George W. Chambers to Quartermaster General John Wood, May 2, 1832; Capt. John Brown to Col. P. Dudley, October 14, 1837; James W. Allen to Quartermaster General John W. Wood, August 20, 1834; William Myers to Quartermaster General John Woods, May 15, 1836; and Capt. John D. Crafton to Quartermaster Pettit, June 1, 1840; all in kmrrb.

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 115 –118 39. Beverly, History and Present State of Virginia, 269, 271; and J. B. Marshall to Adj. Gen. Ambrose Dudley, May 6, 1840, Col. E. G. House to Quartermaster General Ambrose Dudley, April 22, 1843, and Ratliff Baines to Adjutant General Dudley, July 22, 1848, in kmrrb. 40. B. H. Reeves and F. M. Burton to Governor Letcher, June 18, 1844; James A. Harris to Quartermaster General Ambrose Dudley, March 30, 1840; and Lt. Col. Walter Chiles to Governor William Owsley, July 28, 1845,; all in Militia Records, kmrrb. 41. H. K. Berry et al. to Quartermaster General Ambrose Dudley, July 7, 1841; Payton, Bibb, Harrison, and Caldwell to J. B. Temple, August 11, 1852; and William R. Bradford to Gen. A. Dudley, January 16, 1842; all in Militia Records, kmrrb. 42. “Amicus Patriae” [of Kentucky] to Secretary of War James Barbour, October 7, 1826, quoted in Bellesiles, Arming America, 288; and Thomas W. Low[e] to General Dudley, November 4, 1837, Brig. Maj. Henry Leuba to Brig. Gen. William P. Sutton, October 17, 1835, and William M. Samuel to Quartermaster General John W. Wood, April 22, 1840, in Militia Records, kmrrb. Other states experienced the same pattern of militia companies forming out of high enthusiasm, followed by a loss of interest, and finally either simply fading away or voting to disband. See Bellesiles, Arming America, 274. 43. Jesse Stevens to General Hughs, May 29, 1840, Capt. S. D. McCullough to Quartermaster General Dudley; July 15, 1845, General Dudley to Captain McCullough, July 22, 1845, and Capt. H. Marshall to Quartermaster General A. W. Dudley, June 4, 1842; all in kmrrb. Despite the intense competition to obtain weapons, some companies were willing to share their muskets if they had a surplus, as did Capt. W. R. Bradford’s company, which offered “to send over . . . 50 stand arms” to another company; see Captain Bradford to Col. P. Dudley, March 22, 1841, and James Kelly to Quartermaster General John Woods, May 9, 1836, both in kmrrb. For additional examples of arms requests, see C. A. Preston to James Harland, August 21, 1843; J. D. Hill to Governor R. P. Letcher, October 10, 1843; Bob McKee to Governor Letcher, May 22, 1844; Col. R. T. P. Allen to Quartermaster General Ambrose Dudley, April 22, 1845; N. W. Maddux to Governor William Owsley, May 3, 1847; and A. M. Brown to Governor William Owsley, May 10, 1847. All letters in kmrrb. 44. Capt. William R. Bradford to Quartermaster General Ambrose Dudley, July 21, 1845, kmrrb. 45. Capt. Thomas M. Coons to Quartermaster General A. W. Dudley, July 23, 1851, kmrrb. Bellesiles argues that following the Mexican War guns became “the core of essential cultural values”; see Bellesiles, Arming America, 14. [ 190 ]

n o t e s t o p a g e s 119 –12 2 46. H. K. Berry et al. to Quartermaster General Ambrose Dudley, July 7, 1841, kmrrb. For an additional example, see Ratliff Baines to Adjutant General Dudley, July 22, 1848, kmrrb. 47. Franklin, The Militant South, 167. Rod Andrew, Jr., explores the South’s martial culture in a study of military academies; see Andrew, Long Gray Lines. See also A. Tarlton to Unknown, March 11, 1835; John Miller to Quartermaster General A. W. Dudley, May 29, 1841; Capt. William R. Bradford to Quartermaster General A. W. Dudley, July 21, 1845; William P. Chiles to Quartermaster General A. W. Dudley, June 8, 1847; James W. Allen to Quartermaster General John Woods, August 20, 1834. All letters in kmrrb. For additional examples, see Capt. J. F. Busby to Governor William Owsley, March 5, 1841, and C. A. Preston to James Harland, August 21, 1843, in kmrrb. Bellesiles discusses the significance of uniforms to companies across the nation, including an 1858 argument over new uniforms that divided New York’s Thirteenth Regiment; see Bellesiles, Arming America, 274, 288, 391. 48. Clawson, Constructing Brotherhood, 234–36. The story of Edmund Cooper is found in Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes, 158. Sociologist David Gilmore argues that societies around the world expect men to “take an active part in the ritualized dramas of community life.” Such public demonstrations represent “a moral commitment to defend the society and its core values against all odds”; see Gilmore, Manhood in the Making, 91–93, 224. Also see Franklin, The Militant South, 176; and Davis, Parades and Power, 61–64. 49. Perkins, “The Consumer Frontier,” 509; Davis, Parades and Power, 55; Clawson, Constructing Brotherhood, 236. 50. B. H. Reeves and F. M. Burton to Governor Letcher, June 18, 1844, and Brig. Gen. W. S. Pilcher to Adjutant General Dudley, June 9, 1841, both in kmrrb. Annual Message of Governor Gabriel Slaughter printed in the Lexington Kentucky Gazette, December 9, 1816. Also see Snyder, Citizen-Soldiers and Manly Warriors, 87. Richard Bushman discusses the increasing significance of dress and appearance; Bushman, The Refinement of America, 69–74. 51. Xenophon, Cyropeadia, book 1, chap. 2, sections 3–14, pp. 6–10; Machiavelli, Discourses of Niccolo Machiavelli, I.21.1; and Milton, Complete Prose Works, 2: 409. Rousseau was also a proponent of a military education to create manly qualities; see Snyder, Citizen-Soldiers and Manly Warriors, 57. Joshua Goldstein describes how military training was designed to toughen boys for the trials of manhood; see Goldstein, War and Gender, 287–93. Also see Pangle and Pangle, The Learning of Liberty, 45. 52. Thacher, “A Sermon,” in Sandoz, Political Sermons, 1146; Lipscomb, The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, 450–51; and Emerson, “The Man of Letters,” 251. Also [ 191 ]

n o t e s t o p a g e s 12 3 –12 7 see Pangle and Pangle, The Learning of Liberty, 153; Dubbert, A Man’s Place, 57; Kann, A Republic of Men, 92; and Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes, 153, 158. Anya Jabour, in “Masculinity and Adolescence,” examines the adolescent years of Robert Wirt, son of a Virginia patrician. The younger Wirt came of age in the turbulent 1820s, and struggled to develop a masculine self-identity. Attending the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, Wirt hoped to prove both to his parents and to himself that he was no longer a boy but had grown into a soldier and a man. 53. Franklin, The Militant South, 144–45; Skelton, An American Profession of Arms, 122–23; and Knight, A Documentary History of Education, 4:153–62. 54. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 21 and April 4, 1809. 55. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, April 4, 1809. 56. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 25, August 1 and 16, October 23, and November 14, 1814. For Dunn’s return visits, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 13, 20, and 27, 1815; Frankfort Argus of Western America, December 8, 15, and 22, 1830; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 31, September 14, 21, and 28, and October 5 and 12, 1833, October 8, 15, and 29, 1840, and April 23, 1842; and Paris Western Citizen, September 11, 1849. 57. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 9 and 16, 1816 (repeated September 23 and 30, 1816). For additional examples of itinerant military instructors, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 5, 1817, and June 11, 1819. 58. Dubbert, A Man’s Place, 63; Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration, Military History, 116, 250; Stone, A Brittle Sword, 59. 59. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, November 7, 1835; Paris Western Citizen, December 25, 1846, August 6 and September 24, 1847, January 7 and August 25, 1848, and October 19, 1849. 60. Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes, 153, 158. Will M. Garrard to Adj. Gen. Peter Dudley, April 22, 1840, and John W. Finnell to Col. A. G. Hodges, May 1840, in Militia Records, kmrrb. 61. Dubbert, A Man’s Place, 8; Connell, Masculinities, 77. 62. Clawson, Constructing Brotherhood, 164, 173–76, 212; and Snyder, Citizen-Soldiers and Manly Warriors, 3, 11. Also see Nelson, National Manhood, 37; Kann, A Republic of Men, 43; and Connell, Masculinities, 77. 63. Kann, On the Man Question, 292; and Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor, 192.

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 12 8 –13 2 7. Fighters, Protectors, and Men 1. Capt. W. T. Ward, Greenburg Dragoons, to Governor William Owsley, May 26, 1846, William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. 2. Dubbert, A Man’s Place, 55; Connell, Masculinities, 213; and Goldstein, War and Gender, 252–301. For a discussion of the relationship between combat and concepts of masculinity, see Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor, 39; Eubank, “A Time for Heroes,” 177; Gilmore, Manhood in the Making, 150, 175; Kann, A Republic of Men, 30, 45–47, 111, 115, 134; Moore, The Frontier Mind, 80; and Snyder, Citizen-Soldiers and Manly Warriors, 24–25, 35. 3. Western, The English Militia in the Eighteenth Century. 4. For more on republican ideals and perceptions of militia participation in the Revolution, see Cress, Citizens in Arms; and Royster, A Revolutionary People at War. 5. Moore, The Frontier Mind, 80. Gerald Linderman, in Embattled Courage, shows that for Civil War soldiers, courage and manhood were synonymous. Also see Mitchell, “Soldiering, Manhood, and Coming of Age,” 44; and Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor, 39, 358. Michael Kimmel, in Manhood in America, notes, “If manhood could be proved, it had to be proved in the eyes of other men” (26). In his analysis of Civil War soldiers, James McPherson finds that men on both sides sought battle as a test of their manhood. A Confederate from Tennessee wrote, “We are all anxious for a chance to let the Enemy know what kind of men they have to fight,” while a Massachusetts soldier wrote that he “wanted to have a speedy engagement in order to try myself.” See McPherson, For Cause and Comrades, 31. Also see Kann, A Republic of Men, 40; and Gilmore, Manhood in the Making, 35, 51, 224. 6. Capt. W. T. Ward, Greenburg Dragoons, to Governor William Owsley, May 26, 1846, William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs; John Adams to Abigail Adams, February 21, 1777, in Adams, Familiar Letters of John Adams, 248; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 25, 1791; and Maj. Gen. Anthony Wayne to Maj. Gen. Charles Scott, letter published in Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 28, 1793. 7. Frankfort Palladium, May 27, 1812; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 31, 1813. 8. Elizabeth Love to James Love, June 7, 1813, James Young Love Papers, 1785– 1820, fchs; Letter from Maj. Gen. William Henry Harrison’s staff officers, June 3, 1814, John O’Fallon Papers, 1809–1850, fchs; General Orders of Gen. Green Clay, April 7, 1813, printed in Lexington Kentucky Gazette, April 27, 1813; Green

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 13 2 –13 4 Clay, General Orders, July 21, 1813, War of 1812 Muster Roll and General Orders, khs; John Payne’s address to “Fellow Citizens,” Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 2, 1813; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, January 16, 1815. For a discussion of the importance of role models in establishing masculine gender norms, see Kann, A Republic of Men, 115, 134. 9. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, August 24, 1813; and Green Clay’s General Orders, printed in Lexington Kentucky Gazette, July 24, 1813. An account from “camp at [Fort] Defiance,” printed in Lexington Kentucky Gazette, December 15, 1812. 10. John M. Hockaday to Governor William Owsley, June 27, 1846; Allen County Volunteers, Capt. Robert F. Pullman to Governor William Owsley, June 1, 1846; F. Y. Chambers to Governor William Owsley, May 30, 1846; Jno. W. Crockett to Owsley, September 6, 1847; and Brig. Gen. Thomas Johnson to Owsley, May 26, 1846. All letters in William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. 11. Capt. J. B. Payton, Logan Riflemen, to Governor William Owsley, May 28, 1846; E. B. Gaither, Adair Rangers, to Owsley, [1846]; Gaiter to the Honorable Ben. Monroe, May 22, 1846; Capt. B. L. Clarke to Owsley, [1846]; G. W. Barbour to Owsley, May 23, 1846; George W. Johnston to Owsley, May 27, 1846; Thomas Helm to Owsley, May 27, 1846. For additional examples, see Capt. D. McCreery to Adj. Gen. Ambrose W. Dudley, May 26, 1846, and Sherrod Williams to Governor William Owsley, May 29, 1846. All letters in William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. Competition among the ten thousand volunteers for twenty-five hundred slots became so intense that a dispute erupted in Bullitt County over recruits. One company accused another of enlisting men from outside the county, thereby forfeiting their right to serve. See the following letters: Owsley to Capt. R. T. Jacobs, September 15, 1847; Adjutant General Dudley to Jacobs, September 16, 1847; T. Preston to Dudley, September 17, 1847; J. J. Jacobs to R. T. Jacobs, September 18, 1847; and John H. Johnson to R. T. Jacobs, September 18, 1847; all in William Owsley’s Executive Papers, William Owsley’s Papers, khs. Eubank discusses Mexican War volunteers’ fears of missing out on battle and their belief that war was a chance to prove themselves; see Eubank, “A Time for Heroes,” 176, 183. 12. Jno. P. Garvis to Governor William Owsley, [1846], and H. Moore to Owsley, May 26, 1846, in William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs; George B. Jones to Parents, June 8, 1836, George B. Jones Papers, 1836–1837, fchs; and James A. Gaiter to Governor William Owsley, May 26, 1846, William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. Levi White to Wife, September 12, 1846, Levi White Papers, fchs. Caroline Preston to Governor William Owsley, September 16, 1847, William Owsley’s

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 13 4 –13 6 Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. For an additional example, see Governor William Owsley to Maj. Gen. Edmund Pendleton Graves, U.S. Army, Commanding, Western Division, May 17, 1845, William Owsley’s Letter Book, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. Eubank finds that family, especially women, attempted to persuade volunteers to remain at or return home, influencing the attitude and morale of the troops. See Eubank, “A Time for Heroes,” 186. Waldstreicher shows how patriotic celebrations instructed young men about the Revolutionary era and the accomplishments of its leaders; see Waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes, 159–60. 13. Edward Hobson to William Hobson, August 28, 1846, E. H. Hobson Papers, uksc. Also see Kann, A Republic of Men, 30; and Gilmore, Manhood in the Making, 150, 175. 14. Mitchell, “Soldiering, Manhood, and Coming of Age,” 50; and Kann, The Gendering of American Politics, 13–14, 115. Also see Kann, A Republic of Men, 152; and Gilmore, Manhood in the Making, 120–21, 182–84. 15. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 5, 1793; Frankfort Guardian of Freedom, November 23, 1804; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 27, 1809. See also Gen. Green Clay’s General Orders, July 21, 1813, War of 1812 Muster Roll and General Orders, khs. For an additional example, see Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 20, 1812; and Baltimore Whig article reprinted in Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 20, 1812. For additional examples, see Frankfort Palladium, May 27, 1812; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 23 and April 27, 1813, and April 18, 1814. 16. George B. Jones to parents, June 8, 1836, George B. Jones Papers, 1836–1837, fchs; Speed S. Fry to Governor William Owsley, May 18, 1846, William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs; Joseph W. Powell, First Lieutenant, Covington Artillery Guards, to Owsley, September 15, 1845, William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs; C. D. Semple to Honorable Ben. Munroe, June 27, 1845, Miscellaneous Military Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs; and Charles Wickliffe, Ballard Dragoons to Owsley, June 3, 1846, William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. For additional examples, see Jno. P. Garvis to Owsley, May 1846; R. C. Bowling to A. S. Mitchel, May 28, 1846; C. Wickliffe to Owsley, May 30, 1846; and Capt. Joshua Given to Owsley, June 7, 1846, in William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs. Also see R. J. Wilson to Quartermaster General A. Dudley, July 9, 1846, Militia Records, kmrrb; and Eubank, “A Time for Heroes,” 178–79, 181–83. 17. Discussing Americans’ veneration of their forefathers, Bertram Wyatt-Brown comments that along with respect came “the formidable challenge of living up

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 13 6 –13 9 to almost mythological heroes from the family past”; Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor, 118. Len Travers finds examples of such comparisons at July Fourth celebrations, where “boastful militia toasts betrayed young men’s longing to realize their own identities by proving a military skill and ardor equal to those of Washington’s men”; Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 216. See also Forgie, Patricide in the House Divided, 7–8; and the work of Peter Stearns, who in his study of masculinity in Western culture has shown that society’s expectations required “the son . . . to approximate the same attributes of the father.” Stearns, Be A Man!, 19. Similarly, Kann writes, “each male generation must measure up to prior generations”; Kann, A Republic of Men, 33, 79, 139–40, 162. 18. Burage quoted in Mitchell, “Soldiering, Manhood, and Coming of Age,” 51; Rotundo, American Manhood, 234–35. Donald Mrozak concentrates on the Victorian period in “The Habit of Victory.” 19. Kann, On the Man Question, 17, 293; and Mirabeau quoted in Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 56–57. Honore Gabriel Briquette, comte de Mirabeau, was the National Assembly’s most powerful orator. He sought political power by every possible avenue, including persuasion, compromise, and even duplicity. The latter prevented the influence he sought. See Scott and Rotham, Historical Dictionary of the French Revolution, 659–61. Also see Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 206. 20. Steven Watts, in The Republic Reborn, argues that “by sacrificing material pursuits and joining together in heroic enterprise against a threatening enemy . . . they could prove themselves worthy heirs to the Founders. In war the Sons could authenticate the emerging spirit of capitalism and show liberal man to be as morally purposeful as republican man” (271). 21. Hopkins, The Papers of Henry Clay, 1:450; and Calhoun, “Report on the Causes and Reasons for War.” 22. Hopkins, The Papers of Henry Clay, 1:450, 645; Watts, The Republic Reborn, 88. 23. Frankfort Palladium, December 4, 1811; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 11, 1812; Frankfort Palladium, May 6, 1812; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, June 30, 1812. 24. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 8 and December 29, 1812. Mark Kann has observed that one source of males’ masculine anxiety was a pressure “to measure up to the reputations of their pioneering ancestors.” Kann, A Republic of Men, 34. Kentuckians also looked to the nation’s anonymous but collective “fathers” as archetypes of integrity, courage, and manhood. Preparing for battle in October, 1813, Gen. Robert Butler reminded his men of their obligation to fight for “the rights of their insulted country,” and that they must not falter, for

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 14 0 –14 6 they were “the sons of sires whose fame is immortal.” See Lexington Kentucky Gazette, October 12, 1813. 25. Sandoz, Political Sermons, 1551–52; Lexington Kentucky Gazette, September 3, 1811; and Lexington Kentucky Gazette, December 5, 1814. Also see Kann, A Republic of Men, 95. 26. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, March 13, 1815. 27. Recommendation for Henry Clay Irvine, August 31, 1847, and Recommendation for Maj. Charles S. Clarkson, May 29, 1846, in William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs; H. Groesbeck to Governor William Owsley, May 23, 1846, Charles E. Marshall to Governor William Owsley, May 1846, and Joseph W. Powell to Governor William Owsley, May 22, 1846, in William Owsley’s Executive Papers, Governor William Owsley’s Papers, khs; and John H. Lillard to Gen. Christopher Lillard, Kentucky Militia, September 28, 1846, file 5, Lillard Family Papers, 1801–1925, fchs. See also Eubank, “A Time for Heroes,” 174–76. 28. Mosse, The Image of Man, 50–51.; Aries, Western Attitudes toward Death, 72– 79; Kann, A Republic of Men, 115, 163; and Sandoz, Political Sermons, 785. For an additional example, see Hyneman and Lutz, American Political Writing, 1:131; and Elizabeth Love to James Love, June 7, 1813, James Young Love Papers, fchs. Also see Moore, The Frontier Mind, 81–82; and Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor, 45. 29. Hartsock, “Masculinity, Heroism, and the Making of War”; and Kann, A Republic of Men, 35, 164. 30. Lexington Kentucky Gazette, February 18, 1812. 31. Len Travers writes of the War of 1812, “New heroes, worthy inheritors of the Revolutionary tradition, took their places with George Washington and Thomas Jefferson in the pantheon of American patriots”; Travers, Celebrating the Fourth, 207. Conclusion 1. Kentuckian, A Biographical Sketch of Col. Richard M. Johnson, 16. 2. Warner quoted in Lukes, “Political Ritual and Social Integration.” Lukes’s study focuses on post–Civil War America and discusses holidays such as Memorial Day and Armistice or Veterans Day. See also Durkheim, The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, 427. 3. Clawson, Constructing Brotherhood, 14–15; and Brooke, “Ancient Lodges and Self-Created Societies,” 276. On fraternalism, Steven Bullock offers an examination of the Masonic movement in the new republic in Revolutionary Brotherhood. Also see McWilliams, The Idea of Fraternity in America.

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 147 –15 2 Appendix 1. For the third analysis, two companies from the frontier era were examined because of their relatively small size. 2. Clift, The “Corn Stalk” Militia of Kentucky. 3. See the muster rolls of William Caperton, John Dale, John Fithgarrel, William Moore, James Sinclair, Thomas Skidmore, Philip Walker, and John Wallace in Muster Rolls, Kentucky Militia File, khs. 4. See Wilder, Kentucky Soldiers of the War of 1812, for complete muster rolls of those who participated in the war. 5. The companies of Captains Jeremiah Briscoe, Thomas Kennedy, Robert A. Sturges, and Thomas Wornall made up this sample. See Wilder, Kentucky Soldiers of the War of 1812, 244–48. 6. “Muster Roll of Captain Frank Chambers’s Company, 2nd Regt. of the Kentucky Foot Volunteers commanded by Colonel William McKee,” June 1846, Chambers Family Papers, khs.

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Manuscript Collections David Library of the American Revolution, Washington Crossing, Pennsylvania Lyman C. Draper Collection on Microfilm, Ser. cc, Kentucky Papers. Lyman C. Draper Collection on Microfilm, Ser. u, Frontier Wars Papers. Filson Club Historical Society (fchs), Frankfort, Kentucky Jones, George B., Papers, 1836–1837. Lillard Family Papers, 1801–1925. O’Fallon, John. Papers, 1809–1850. Scott, Charles. Journal, 1793–1794. White, Levi. Papers, 1819–1846. Young Love, James. Papers, 1785–1861. Kentucky Historical Society (khs), Martin F. Schmidt Library, Microfilm Collection, Frankfort Bourbon County Tax Records, 1840. Chambers Family Papers. Fayette County Tax Records, 1840. Franklin County Tax Records, 1840. Garrard County Tax Records, 1840. Greenup, Governor Christopher. Papers. Kentucky Militia File. Kentucky Tax Lists. Miscellaneous Military Papers. Owsley, Governor William. Papers. Shelby, Governor Isaac. Papers. Wayne, Gen. Anthony. Field Book. War of 1812 Muster Roll and General Orders Kentucky Military Records and Research Branch (kmrrb) Library, Frankfort Militia Records [ 199 ]

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@e[\o

Adair, John: at Battle of New Orleans, 13; and patriotism, 106–7; as political candidate, 91–93, 182n60, 182n63; as subject of toasts, 35 Adams, John, 43, 130 Adams, John Quincy, 80–81 African Americans: being excluded from celebration rituals, 41–42, 101; and first state constitution, 176n16; militia units composed of, 164n47; as percentage of Kentucky’s population, 167n60; and social hierarchy, 111–12 Alien and Sedition Acts, 75 Allen County, Kentucky, 133 Armstrong, John, 105 Barrow, Robert H., 100, 184–85n7 Bath County, Kentucky, 57, 115 Beverly, Robert, 115 Blue Licks, Battle of, 11 Boone, Daniel, 44, 56 Bourbon County, Kentucky, 147, 148, 149; economic crisis in, 58–59, 60; iron works in, 57 Bourbon County Committee, 77, 78, 86, 97; and election of 1840, 84; and first state constitution, 71–73; and Mississippi River navigation, 57–58; and second state constitution, 73–74. See also William Henry Boyd, John P., 35 Boyle County, Kentucky, 135 Bracken County, Kentucky, 84 Bradford, William, 50

Buena Vista, Battle of, 16 Bullitt County, Kentucky, 194n11 Burr, Aaron, 51 Calhoun, John C., 103, 137 celebrations: for Battle of Fallen Timbers, 23; for Battle of New Orleans, 23; for Battle of the Thames, 23; for internal improvements, 37–38; for Kentucky statehood, 32–33; for Lexington Light Infantry anniversary, 37; for Louisiana Purchase, 31, 37; for repeal of taxes, 37. See also July Fourth; Washington’s Birthday Chambers, Frank, 152–53 Chesapeake and Leopard affair, 51–52 Christian County, Kentucky, 81 Cipriani, John, 64 civic virtue: and defense of home, 135; as indication of manhood, 98–99, 103, 137, 139–40; 184n2. See also masculinity civil disorder: in Clay County, Kentucky, 54–56, 171n20; in Cynthiana, Kentucky, 52; in Frankfort, Kentucky, 53; in Georgetown, Kentucky, 52–53; in Lexington, Kentucky, 50–51; in Limestone, Kentucky, 50; in Manchester, Kentucky, 54–56; in Mason County, Kentucky, 50; in Nicholasville, Kentucky, 53; partisanship leading to, 52–53; in Russellville, Kentucky, 55 Clark, George Rogers, 11, 35 Clark County, Kentucky, 107, 147, 148

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i nd e x Clay, Green, 132, 135 Clay, Henry: calling for a new generation of heroes, 137, 138; on discipline, 103; and election of 1824, 80–81, 87–88; speech on July Fourth by, 20; speech to militia by, 74–75; as subject of toasts, 82; visiting Kentucky, 27 Clay, Henry, Jr., 44 Clay County, Kentucky, 54–56, 171n20 community identity, 36–39, 45–47, 144–46 Compensation Act of 1816, 78–79 constitution: first state, 68–73, 79, 176n148; second state, 73–74, 177n20 courage, 103, 109–10, 134, 138 Cynthiana, Kentucky, 52, 85 Danville, Kentucky, 69, 96, 97 Dauphin County, Kentucky, 94 Dearborn, Henry, 51 deference: militia reinforcing, 39–41, 45–47, 102, 110–11, 144–46; and politics, 67, 86 discipline, 103–4, 138 Dudley, Peter: and Clay County insurrection, 54–56, 171n20; supporting Henry Clay, 81; and weapons dispute, 118; and weapons purchase, 63 Dunn, R. I., 64, 123–24 duty, 103, 104–5, 186n16 economy, 48, 56–65, 171n22; militia impact on policies concerning, 57– 62, 174n42; militia influence on local, 62–65. See also militia Eisenhower, Dwight D., 87 election: of 1824, 80–81, 87–88, 183n70; of 1828, 81–82, 88; of 1840, 83–85, 88 Ellerback, Joseph, 64, 123 Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 122 enrolled militia: in comparison to volunteer, 14–16, 40–41; decline of, 13, 68, 80; political significance of, 79, 96–97. See also militia; volunteer militia

Estill County, Kentucky, 119 Fallen Timbers, Battle of, 11, 23, 33, 172n23 Faulkner, William, 1–3 Fayette County, Kentucky, 147, 148, 149, 153; Hickory Artillery Company in, 85; militia debating constitution in, 71; polling by militia in, 71; support for Andrew Jackson in, 81–82; William Henry Harrison visiting, 26 Fayette County Committee, 72 Fleming, William, 69 Frankfort, Kentucky: celebrating 1800 election, 80; celebrating 1828 election, 82; celebrating July Fourth, 30; civil disorder in, 53; memorial services in, 44; muster in, 131; support for Henry Clay in, 81; support for Andrew Jackson in, 81–82 Franklin, Benjamin, 27–28 Franklin County, Kentucky, 147 fraternal organizations, 3, 113, 158n3 funerals, 43–45, 167n63 gambling, 51 Garrard, James, 95 Garrard County, Kentucky, 147, 151 Georgetown, Kentucky, 34, 52–53, 85 Georgetown College, 125 Grant, Ulysses S., 87 Greenup, Christopher, 49, 51, 169n9 Harmar, Josiah, 11 Harrisburg, Kentucky, 94 Harrison, William Henry: at Battle of the Thames, 13; at Battle of Tippecanoe, 12; and election of 1840, 84, 88; and military career leading to politics, 87; and patriotism, 106; as role model, 131, 134; as subject of toasts, 35; visiting Kentucky, 25–26, 85 Harrodsburg, Kentucky, 32, 36 hemp, 59 Henry, William, 78, 79, 86, 96; and first

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i nd e x state constitution, 71–73; and Mississippi River navigation, 57–58; and second state constitution, 73–74. See also Bourbon County Committee Hickory Artillery Company, 68, 85–87, 97 Hobson, Edward, 134 honor, 103, 108–9, 131–32, 138, 141–43, 187n23 Hopkinsville, Kentucky, 35, 59–60, 81 iron production, 56–57, 172nn23–24 Jackson, Andrew: at Battle of New Orleans, 13, 92; and election of 1824, 80–81, 87–88; and election of 1828, 81–82, 88; questioning militia’s usefulness, 14; as subject of toasts, 82; visiting Kentucky, 25–26 Jay’s Treaty, 60 Jefferson, Thomas: advocating military training, 121–22; memorial service for, 43; as subject of toasts, 27, 29, 41 Jessamine County, Kentucky, 147 Johnson, Richard M., 145; commemorating Battle of the Thames, 23; and courage, 109–10; economic leadership of, 59; and honor, 108; honored by Scott County, 36; killing Tecumseh, 13, 93; as political candidate, 93; as subject of toasts, 34 July Fourth: activities described, 20–23, 39, 157n2; economic activities at, 62; significance of celebrations during, 3, 134; toast making at, 27–31, 60–61; and white male unity, 110 Kennedy, Thomas, 151 Kentucky Military Institute, 124–25 Knox County, Kentucky, 104 Lafayette, Marquis de, 24–25, 43, 158n10, 159n12 laws governing militia: eighteenth century, 10, 12, 14; and Militia Act

of 1903 (Dick Act), 156n4; nineteenth century, 14–15; and slave patrols, 170n15; and Uniform Militia Act of 1792, 12, 112; and Wilderness Road, 172n23. See also militia Lee, Henry, 50 Letcher, Robert, 32 Lexington, Kentucky: celebrating Battle of New Orleans anniversary, 24; celebrating 1828 election, 82; celebrating July Fourth, 20, 27–28, 34, 42; celebrating Light Infantry anniversary, 37; civil disorder in, 50–51; James Monroe visiting, 25; law enforcement in, 49; memorial services held in, 43–44; military accouterments sold in, 64; militia contests in, 38; militia muster at, 36–37, 131; militia and politics in, 77–79; militia theater in, 38; possible slave rebellion in, 54 Lexington Legion, 55 Lexington Light Infantry: anniversary celebration held by, 37, 164n45; celebrating July Fourth, 20; celebrating Louisiana Purchase, 37; celebrating repeal of taxes, 37; commemorating Battle of New Orleans, 24; military campaigns of, 16; opposing partisan militia, 83; participating in funerals, 43; participating in militia competition, 38; and political dispute, 77–79 Limestone, Kentucky, 50 Locke, John, 103 Logan, Benjamin, 12 Logan County, Kentucky, 76 Louisville, Kentucky, 24–26, 59 L’Ouverture, Toussaint, 42 Macon County, Kentucky, 84 Machiavelli, Niccolo, 103, 121 Madison County, Kentucky, 147, 148; celebrating Kentucky statehood, 32; politics and militia in, 75; polling at muster in, 82; response to Clay County insurrection in, 55–56

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i nd e x Madison, George, 44 Madison, James, 29 masculinity: and combat as test against forefathers’ legacy, 101, 130, 136–43, 195–96n17, 196–97n24; crisis of, 99–101, 129–30; and death through combat, 141–43; and defense of home, 130, 135–36, 141; origins of, 100, 128–29, 141, 185n7; the traditional association of combat and, 128, 129–30, 130–35, 141, 193n5. See also civic virtue Manchester, Kentucky, 54–56, 171n20 Marcy, William L., 107 Marshall, Humphrey, 69, 109 Mason County, Kentucky, 50 McAfee, Robert, 36, 62 McCalla, Andrew, 50 McCalla, John, 77–79, 83 Mercer County, Kentucky, 147, 148; celebrating Kentucky statehood, 32; politics and militia in, 76–77 Mexican War, Kentucky militia participation in, 16, 17, 18–19 military training: economic impact of, 64–65; instilling masculine traits, 102, 121–26; and uniforms, 119–20 militia: and civil disturbances, 50–53; competition between units of, 38–39, 164n50; and democratization, 4, 67–79; 176nn11–12; exemptions from service, 10, 15; first muster of, 10; horses, preference to fight from, 11, 13; and insurrections, 53–55; and law enforcement, 49–50, 168n1–2; maintaining community order, 48–56; political office holding among, 17–19, 68, 87–97, 148, 150, 152; racial hierarchy reinforced by, 3, 22, 42–43, 45–47, 144–46; slave ownership among, 16– 19, 148–53; on slave patrols, 170n15; social hierarchy reinforced by, 3, 22, 39–43, 45–47, 144–46; as theater actors, 38; Virginia origins of, 10; white male unity created by, 39–42,

45–47, 101–2, 110–13. See also African Americans; civil disorder; economy; enrolled militia; laws governing militia; officers; politics; volunteer militia; women Milton, John, 121 Mirabeau, Honore, 137, 196n19 Mississippi River, 57–58, 60, 70 Monroe, James, 25–26, 159n13 Montgomery County, Kentucky, 80 Morehead, Charles, 16 Muth, Guts, 103 national identity, creation of, 22–31, 45–47, 144–46 Native Americans: battles with, 11, 12, 172n24; and threat to settlers, 9–10, 56–57, 130–31 New Orleans, Battle of: 13, 114; commemoration of, 23–24; and Court of Inquiry, 92, 156n6, 182n61 Nicholas, George, 73 Nicholasville, Kentucky, 53, 85 Nullification Crisis, 53 officers: elections of militia, 10, 40, 188n29; leadership in economic crisis by militia, 59–60, 173n30; with military careers leading to politics, 87– 96, 181n52, 183n64, 183n70; social influence of militia, 39–40, 188n30. See also militia Owsley, William, 54–56, 107 Paine, Thomas, 98 Panic of 1819, 59, 75, 80, 94 Paris, Kentucky, 14 Partridge, Alden, 122–23 patriotism, 103, 105–8 Pinckney’s Treaty, 58 Political Club of Danville, 79 politics, 4, 67–68, 80–87, 180n40; militia opposition to partisan, 82–83. See also militia Polk, James K., 16

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i nd e x Pope, John, 78, 178n27 receptions for dignitaries, 24–26 regional identity, creation of, 31–36, 45–47, 144–46 religious services, 21, 32, 155n4 Richmond, Kentucky, 55–56 River Raisin, Battle of: description of, 12; Lexington Light Infantry’s participation in, 37; remembrance of, 109; as subject of toasts, 30 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques, 30, 103 Russell, William, 39 Russellville, Kentucky, 43, 45, 52 salt production, 56–57, 172n23 Scott, Charles: and army supplies, 63, 174n43; calling for a new generation of heroes, 138; as candidate for governor, 89–90; as commander of First Division, 12; commemorating the Battle of Fallen Timbers, 23; as role model, 131; as subject of toasts, 33 Scott County, Kentucky, 147; honoring Richard M. Johnson, 36; July Fourth celebrations in, 21, 29; Louisiana Purchase celebration in, 31; Marquis de Lafayette visiting, 25 Shaw, John R., 123 Shelby, Isaac: at Battle of the Thames, 13; bidding to supply militia, 63; memorial service for, 43; and patriotism, 106; as political candidate, 89, 91, 181n58; and political dispute, 76; and possible slave rebellion, 54; presiding at first constitutional convention, 69; as subject of toasts, 27–28, 34; and support received as a candidate, 77 Shelbyville, Kentucky, 27 Simpson County, Kentucky, 133 Slaughter, Gabriel, 77, 91, 121, 181n58 slave rebellions, 54 St. Clair, Arthur, 11, 104 Steuben, Baron Friedrich Von, 10, 64

Taylor, Zachary, 16, 25, 26–27, 134 Tecumseh, 13, 34, 93 Thames, Battle of, 13, 34, 89, 108, 109, 145 Tippecanoe, Battle of, 12 toast making: and community identity, 37; and economic issues, 60–62; and national identity, 27–31; and politics, 82; and regional identity, 31, 33–36; reinforcing social hierarchies, 41–43, 45–47; significance of, 168n71 Tocqueville, Alexis de, 105–6 Transylvania University, 44 Trotter, George, 54 uniforms, 5; as indicator of wealth, 120; and morale, 119; purchase of, 63–64; reinforcing masculinity, 102, 119–21, 123 Van Buren, Martin, 25–26, 84 Versailles, Kentucky, 30, 85 volunteer militia: in comparison to enrolled, 14–16, 40–41; in comparison to fraternal organizations, 15; as an expression of manhood, 100; as a partisan organization, 68, 81–87, 97; rise of, 14, 80. See also enrolled militia; militia War of 1812, Kentucky militia experience in, 12–13 Washington, George: memorial service for, 43; and military career leading to politics, 87; as role model, 134; as subject of toasts, 27–28, 41. See also Washington’s Birthday Washington’s Birthday, 23, 110 Wayne, Anthony, 11, 23, 131, 172n23 weapons: 5, 189n36; for ceremonies, 115–16; competition for, 117–19, 190n43; as indicator of wealth, 120; lack of maintenance of, 116–17; and morale, 116; purchase of, 63; reinforcing masculinity, 102, 113–19

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i nd e x West, the, 31 Western Military Institute, 125 Wilderness Road, 56, 63, 172n23 Wilkinson, James, 49 Winchester, Kentucky, 41, 82 Winchester, James: at Battle of River Raisin, 12; and care of weapons, 114; as a constitutional convention delegate, 69; on discipline, 104

women: being excluded from celebration rituals, 41–42, 101, 166nn57–59; and social hierarchy, 111–12 Woodford County, Kentucky, 147; July Fourth celebrations in, 30; Marquis de Lafayette visiting, 25 Xenophon, 121

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st udies in wa r , societ y, a nd t he mili ta ry

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Citizens More than Soldiers The Kentucky Militia and Society in the Early Republic Harry S. Laver Soldiers as Citizens Former German Officers in the Federal Republic of Germany, 1945–1955 Jay Lockenour Army and Empire British Soldiers on the American Frontier, 1758–1775 Michael N. McConnell The Militarization of Culture in the Dominican Republic, from the Captains General to General Trujillo Valentina Peguero Arabs at War Military Effectiveness, 1948–1991 Kenneth M. Pollack The Politics of Air Power From Confrontation to Cooperation in Army Aviation Civil-Military Relations Rondall R. Rice Andean Tragedy Fighting the War of the Pacific, 1879–1884 William F. Sater The Grand Illusion The Prussianization of the Chilean Army William F. Sater and Holger H. Herwig Sex Crimes under the Wehrmacht David Raub Snyder The Paraguayan War Volume 1: Causes and Early Conduct Thomas L. Whigham The Challenge of Change Military Institutions and New Realities, 1918–1941 Edited by Harold R. Winton and David R. Mets