The Price They Didn’t
Pay
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| Independence Hall |
For over
fifteen years a document has been circulating the Internet lauding the signers
of the Declaration of Independence and stating how many of them paid a high
price for their courage in signing it. It is often e-mailed around elections
and the 4th of July as a means to prompt receivers into thinking
patriotically about the alleged high price paid by those 56 signers over the
course of the War of Independence from 1776 to 1783. It alleges that several
signers were killed by the British during the war, some were tortured, many had
their property taken from them, and they were targeted for retribution and
death. This document is for the most part a complete fabrication and when it is
not stretching the truth, it is deliberately lying.
The history
of this piece of fiction is interesting in itself. The earliest known version
of it was found in Paul Harvey’s The Rest
of the Story published in 1956. The 1950s were a decade best remembered for
its theme of anti-communism which permeated all levels of American society. A
great deal of patriotism, both factual and fictional was used to counter any
potential communist thought from developing in the US, and it appears that this
fabrication was part of that fictional patriotic output. Since then, it has
appeared in various forms and was actually made part of the Congressional
Record by Senator Strom Thurmond of South Carolina. Years later Rush Limbaugh
used the article on his talk show and website and attributed the authorship to
his father, Rush H. Limbaugh, Sr.  |
| Declaration of Independence |
Since the
1990s the article has been circulated repeatedly via the Internet and has
become an urban myth. Many websites list it as a factual based document when it
is nothing of the sort. Instead, it is a nothing more than what it was intended
to be; an article written to influence people to consider associated material
or ideas in a positive light. The problem is that it is a gross distortion of
the actual events of the Revolution and in many places the details are just
completely wrong. While signing the Declaration of Independence was an obvious
break with Great Britain and is seen as the point where Americans formally
rejected their ties with Great Britain, the truth is that Americans had been in
the process of eliminating British authority in 1775 throughout the colonies.
The Declaration was the document that made the revolt official, but people had
been in combat for over a year at that point and General George Washington was
preparing to repel a British Army which landed at Staten Island on July 3rd.
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| Franklin, Adams, and Jefferson |
Not a
single signer was killed by the British during the American Revolution as the
article states. In fact, there is no evidence that any signer was singled out
for retribution by the British for that act. The idea of this article is that
these signers were punished for their act of signing the Declaration. In
reality, these men were for the most part wealthy men who suffered from the
economic upheaval brought about by the war. They suffered crop and livestock
losses from both armies who foraged supplies and sometimes paying and sometimes
not. Actually, the signers from the South lost the most because they usually
had slaves who took advantage of the situation to escape. However, these
signers were not suffering any more than anyone else in the Revolution. They
had wealth to use to alleviate their suffering. The people that paid the real
price in this war were the common folk who literally sacrificed everything.
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| Thomas Nelson, Jr. |
It was one
thing for a wealthy man to suffer some losses. It was another for poor people
to sacrifice things that they need. If the signers were singled out for
punishment then why were so many of their properties left relatively unharmed?
Thomas Jefferson, the man who wrote the original draft of the Declaration
barely escaped capture at Monticello, his home, in 1781. Yet, the home was not
destroyed. Neither was Mount Vernon, George Washington’s home during the year
of British raiding in Virginia that year before Lord Cornwallis settled down at
Yorktown awaiting reinforcements. One particular home the article claims was
destroyed was that of Thomas Nelson, Jr., who it also claims died bankrupt
after the war as a result.
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| Thomas Nelson, Jr. House at the Yorktown NPS Battleground |
The tale of
Thomas Nelson, Jr. and his home may be the biggest and easiest falsehood to
prove out of the many in the article. Revolutionary War myth states that
Nelson’s home was used by the British as a headquarters during the Siege of
Yorktown and that Nelson urged General Washington to fire artillery at the
house. This story exists in multiple forms and in at least one form the house
was not Nelson’s but rather his uncle. In any event, it is easily proven that
this part of the article is completely wrong because the house stands to this
day as part of the Colonial National Historical Park maintained by the National
Park Service. Some damage from cannon fire is evident on the southeast face of
the house, but the house which was restored in 1976 along with the siege
earthworks and is a National Historic Landmark.
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| Gwinnet-Lochlan Duel |
As for the
claim made that five signers were captured by the British and were tortured
before they died, the historical record shows that while some signers were
captured in the war, none were tortured and none died from wounds inflicted by the
British. In fact, only nine signers died during the war and seven of those were
older men who died from natural causes or disease. One signer, Thomas Lynch,
Jr., was lost at sea when his ship disappeared on a voyage with all hands. The
only signer to die of wounds was Button Gwinnet of Georgia. However, the wounds
were not inflicted by the British, but rather a fellow American in a duel. Five
signers were captured during the war, but the closest thing to torture any of
them faced was Richard Stockton.
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| Richard Stockton |
Stockton
could be said to be singled out for capture because of his status, but he was
captured by loyalists who sought favor with the British occupiers of New Jersey
in 1776. He was placed among the rest of the American prisoners in the infamous
prison ships anchored in New York City’s harbor where miserable conditions
broke his health. He signed a parole in exchange for his release in 1777 which
was a common and routine matter in that era. However, his treatment and ill
health as a result of the imprisonment did not kill him. Stockton died from
cancer in February, 1781 instead of the results of British torture. Of the
other four men who were captured, one was captured at the Battle of Savannah
(1778) and the rest when Charleston fell in 1780. None of them were mistreated
during their imprisonment. All were exchanged in the year following their
capture.
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| John Hart |
A few other
allegations are made in this article such as two signers having their sons
killed during the war. None of the signers lost a son during the war. Some of
the claims about signers being hounded by the British and dying as a result are
incorrect as well. John Hart of New Jersey is cited in one segment as being
driven from his wife’s bedside. She had died the previous year. It claims his
children had to flee with him. They were all adults. It then claims he died the
following year. That would be difficult to do since John Hart was reelected two
more times to the Continental Congress, once as Speaker of the House of New
Jersey, and died in 1779 from his kidney stones.
By now, I’m
sure you have decided for yourselves that the article is a fake. For those of
you who wish to believe a myth instead of reality I invite you to do some
investigation of your own. There are multiple sources of information available
which tell the story of the American Revolution and the War of Independence as
well as that of the Declaration of Independence. I consulted several sources in
verifying the facts that prove “The Price They Paid” is an extremely inaccurate
propaganda piece which contains nothing of factual value whatsoever. The story
of the Revolution is a powerful one, and the men and women who participated in
it deserve for the truth to be told.
References
Bell, J.L. Boston 1775 website. http://boston1775.blogspot.com/
Several articles. (accessed June 13,
2013).
Ferling, John. A Leap in the Dark: The Struggle to Create
the American Republic. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2003.
John Ferling. Independence: The Struggle to set America
Free. New York: Bloomsbury Press, 2011.
Maier, Pauline. American
Scripture: Making the Declaration of Independence. New York: Knopf, 1997.
Middlekauf, Robert. The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution,
1763-1789. 2nd edition. Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2005.
Ramsay, David. The
History of the American Revolution, 2 vols. Edited by Lester H. Cohen. Philadelphia: R. Aitken & Son,
1789; Liberty Fund, 2010, http://oll.libertyfund.org (accessed November 14, 2011).
Snopes. “The Price They Paid.” http://www.snopes.com/history/american/pricepaid.asp (accessed June 13, 2013).
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