Revolutionary War Symbols and Icons

I've commented before on the iconography of the American Revolution.  Taking a closer look at the Princeton Battle Monument, we can find an interesting collection of symbols and images that provide broader connotations for the war.  Here is the base as the front:

It is not easy to make it all out in this small image.  As we look at it, in the block on the far left, we see rifles and bayonets.  In the center, an eagle with wings spread is between two cannons.  Smoke appears to be billowing from the opening of each.  In the eagle's talons is a length of broken chain.  Just below the eagle are a powder horn and pistols.  On the far right are a drum, two bugles and barrels.   I have not identified everything in the image.  What we do so connotes not just the components of battle, but the clear political symbolism of the broken chain.  Why the eagle as the symbol of the country during the Revolution? The National Wildlife Federation site posits that "[a]t the time, the new nation was still at war with England, and the fierce-looking bird seemed to be an appropriate emblem." The Bald Eagle Foundation notes "[t]he bald eagle was chosen June 20, 1782 as the emblem of the United States of American, because of its long life, great strength and majestic looks, and also because it was then believed to exist only on this continent."

A 1922 account of the monument is available for reading on line.  It was designed by the Beaux-Arts sculptor Frederick William MacMonnies (1863–1937).  He collaborated with architect Thomas Hastings (1860–1929).  The project, commissioned in 1908, was not completed until 1922.

Battlefields and Poems

The fierce and sudden snow of the other day that wreaked such havoc began to vanish as the temperatures again rose above freezing, so I went to Princeton Battlefield, looking for a sense of winter on the field of battle on January 3, 1777.  I have always been intrigued by the combined mass grave, shown here in the foreground.  We look through the remains of a mansion across the field and towards the American lines.

Alfred Noyes in May 1917 wrote a commemorative poem, a couple of lines which are on a grave marker shown here; the exact location may not be in this exact spot but we are told that 21 British and 15 American soldiers are buried together.  Part of the poem reads:

Through this May night, if one great ghost should stray
  With deep remembering eyes,
Where that old meadow of battle smiles away
  Its blood-stained memories,        
If Washington should walk, where friend and foe
  Sleep and forget the past,
Be sure his unquenched heart would leap to know
  Their souls are linked at last.

Noyes was the poet laureate of England, and wrote this poem for this battlefield years into the carnage of World War I.  It is, perhaps, hard to read the archaic lines from almost a century ago.  There is also something discordant about trying to express the horror of war in neatly rhyming and pseudo-soaring lines.  Still, what is interesting is the reference to the "linked souls" of enemies, buried together, and that they "sleep and forget the past." Such a lesson of forgiveness or forgetfulness is hardly reflected in the decades-old cycles of violence that circle the globe today.

Kingston Mill, the Revolution and History

Kingston Mill, shown here during the East Coast snowstorm on December 14, is an historic spot.  

The bridge was a replacement built in 1798 for the wooden bridge destroyed by Washington after the Battle of Princeton.  About 100 yards away is a marker referring to the "horseback conference" in which Washington decided to take his force to Jockey Hollow for the winter rather than attack the British at New Brunswick.  After the Revolution, during the early part of the nineteenth century, the Delaware and Raritan Canal was built; there is a lock at Kingston past the left edge of the photograph.  Past the right edge of the photograph, the road was part of the Lincoln Highway designation in the early twentieth century.  The mill itself, testament to the Industrial Revolution, was built in the late nineteenth century.  This place is filled with history across the formation and growth of the country.

Quakers, the Revolution and Profiling

Conventional understandings of the American Revolution often focus on a two-party dispute between the "Americans" and the "British." Among the colonists were diverse groups; one notable group were the Quakers.  In New Jersey in particular, numerous Friends Meeting Houses were present.  Here is the one at Stony Brook, which feature to an extent in accounts of the Battle of Princeton nearby, and a portion of its cemetery, featuring the DAR stone noting that Richard Stockton, a lawyer and signer of the Declaration of Independence, is buried on the grounds.

The Quakers officially adopted a neutral stance, although there were exceptions--not just Richard Stockton, but "The Fighting Quaker," Nathanael Greene.  However, they were often viewed with suspicion, treated as spies or otherwise harassed by certain Patriots.  Note George Washington's comments in a November, 1777 authorization regarding Army Clothing:  "By virtue of the powers vested in me by the Honorable Congress I hereby Authorize ... to collect all such Blankets, Shoes, Stocking and other Clothing suitable to the use of the Army, within the Counties of ... in the State of Pennsylvania, as the Inhabitants can spare without greatly distressing their Families. In doing this you are to take care, that, the unfriendly Quakers and others notoriously disaffected to the cause of American Liberty do not escape your Vigilance."

One cannot help but think of the current debate over profiling of certain groups as security risks.