Enemies to Their Country
208 pages, 6 x 9
6 tables
Paperback
Release Date:30 Sep 2025
ISBN:9781625348951
Hardcover
Release Date:30 Sep 2025
ISBN:9781625348968
Enemies to Their Country
The Marblehead Addressers and Consensus in the American Revolution
University of Massachusetts Press
Complicating the American Revolution through a microhistory of one Massachusetts town
In 1774, a group of elite men in the town of Marblehead, Massachusetts, just outside Salem, wrote an address to the royal governor thanking him for his service to the colony, even as town residents began demanding independence from Great Britain. Town meeting records reveal how the town’s patriot majority pressured the signers to withdraw their support for the governor and demanded public recantations and issued damning reports, even forcing some of the signers into exile.
Enemies to Their Country tells the story of the year following the Address, chronicling the town’s struggle to achieve consensus even as the war for American independence started. This microhistory of one vitally important town, the second largest in Massachusetts at the time, with a thriving local economy based on fishing and a robust community of religious and civically engaged citizens, complicates simplistic ideas of the American Revolution. Through compelling stories of neighboring individuals and families, many of which have not been told, it also provides an example of a politically polarized constituency struggling to find consensus at a time of great conflict.
In 1774, a group of elite men in the town of Marblehead, Massachusetts, just outside Salem, wrote an address to the royal governor thanking him for his service to the colony, even as town residents began demanding independence from Great Britain. Town meeting records reveal how the town’s patriot majority pressured the signers to withdraw their support for the governor and demanded public recantations and issued damning reports, even forcing some of the signers into exile.
Enemies to Their Country tells the story of the year following the Address, chronicling the town’s struggle to achieve consensus even as the war for American independence started. This microhistory of one vitally important town, the second largest in Massachusetts at the time, with a thriving local economy based on fishing and a robust community of religious and civically engaged citizens, complicates simplistic ideas of the American Revolution. Through compelling stories of neighboring individuals and families, many of which have not been told, it also provides an example of a politically polarized constituency struggling to find consensus at a time of great conflict.
‘This is an enticing microhistory of the American Revolution that invites readers to consider how the members of one New England town came together to fight for political independence.’—Christopher P. Magra, author of Poseidon’s Curse: British Naval Impressment and Atlantic Origins of the American Revolution
‘There is much we can learn from Marblehead in these years, both about the course of the American Revolution, and about the dynamics of local politics. Gentile knows this story better than anyone. It is refreshing to see a book that draws our attention away from Boston, and to this community which has such a vivid story to tell.’—Robert J. Allison, author of The American Revolution: A Very Short Introduction
NICHOLAS W. GENTILE is an independent historian.
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