loan. could you ultimately change your mind and take it back? what is the idea of a permanent loan designation? >> i could always give it, but i would like to own it. i can make sure it will be displayed in appropriate ways. if they put it in the basement, is not convinced it displayed appropriately. upon my death i suspect these organizations will be happy. >> as we sit in front of the magna carta, i will say thank you for spending and half an hour with us. >> my pleasure. >> up next, other tenants davis discusses his book, the hidden

history of america at war. he explores the challenges the u.s. military phase from the u.s. revolutionary war to the war in iraq. he talks about the popular misconceptions about the american revolution and the civil and vietnam wars. this event is about an hour. mr. davis: good evening, everyone. i am always so pleased when i hear someone did not know much about history as a teenager 20 years ago. i run into this a lot. i read your book when i was 16. i am 40 now. that is why it is the 25th anniversary edition. thank you all for coming. it is an honor to be here in fraunces tavern. i am a lover of all places historical. i have been since i was a small child. in fact, when i was a kid, our

idea of summer vacation was throwing mummy bags, army surplus sleeping bags, and a canvas tent in the back of the car and go off to places like fort ticonderoga, gettysburg, valley forge. visiting those places as a kid gave me the sense that history is not something that happens in books. it happens to real people in real places. that is the idea that has driven me throughout my career -- to make history as exciting, interesting, and, most of all, human as it was for me as a child. i stood at the battlefield in gettysburg. i remember it like it was yesterday. it was 1963. the centennial anniversary of the battle of gettysburg. i remember being a child, standing there, not fully understanding what the civil war

was about. what the gettysburg address was about. what had really happened gettysburg. but knowing, in my heart, as i stood there, feeling the summer heat with those stones -- if you have been there, they are unforgettable -- i knew something extraordinary had happened. this was a sacred place. i took home from the visit in 1963 a small wooden revolver, a souvenir, with the dates of the battle stamped on the barrel. i keep it on my desk as a reminder of what history really means. when i set out to write more than 25 years ago, hard to believe, but when i set out, i wanted to maintain a sense of

childlike wonder about history. i could not understand people saying, history is so dull. so boring. all these dates and battles and speeches. history is anything but that. it is the story of real people and real places. when you are in a place like this, and history is palpable, it gives me that feeling. it is wonderful to be in this flag room. as you know, sunday is flag day. but more importantly, june 14 is the 240th anniversary of the birth of the u.s. army. we will talk about that tonight. but i want to reflect on the flag for a moment.

there is so much mythology, and that is one of the things we will be talking about, the mythology that permeates our history of the flag. one of my favorite characters in history is frances hopkinson, a signer of the declaration of independence and who takes credit for the design of the betsy ross flag. that was a family story handed down for a generation, not published for more than 100 years after the revolution. someone came across a bill that hopkinson had submitted to the congress for the design of the flag, cited as evidence of his hand in designing the stars and stripes.

it was interesting because hopkinson asked in payment for his services for a quarter cask of the public wine. i did not know we had a public wine in 1777, when he submitted the bill. they turned him down because he was on the payroll. but the case of wine is interesting because here we are in this tavern. as i am sure many of you know, george washington was not a man who would turn down a glass of port. on that evening in december, 1783, i am sure the port was passed around. if you have been to mount vernon and seen it, by the time he

retired from the presidency, george washington was america's largest distiller of whiskey. he owned a distillery at mount vernon. it was producing 11,000 gallons of whiskey a year by 1800. so he was the owner of the largest distillery in america at that time. and this came after he suppressed the whiskey rebellion, farmers who did not want to pay taxes on whiskey. but it brings me to washington being here. this extraordinary place, where he did say farewell on 1783. i want to take you to the other end of the story, the day he becomes commander of the u.s. army. we should back up a little and refresh ourselves on the dates

and settings and scene. april 19, 1775, shots fired at lexington and concord. washington was on his way to philadelphia at that time, the second congressional continental congress. he knew this really meant war would be coming. by the time he arrived in philadelphia, wearing a blue army suit, by the way, blue military uniform he had made for him, he had military experience. it was a not-so-subtle hint of his ambitions and interests as he came to philadelphia. he was the only one wearing a military uniform in philadelphia in 1775.

the unit for that uniform was made for him by a scottish tailor named andrew judge. he was an indentured servant at the mount vernon plantation as a tailor. he had a child with one of washington's enslaved people, whose name was oney judge. a little departure, but because it fits in with what i am talking about in terms of yorktown, oney judge was the only person who escaped as a slave while washington was president. the man who made washington's uniform, the father of a slave who runs away from washington. this is the true story of american history that is so much better than any novel could be. these are the fascinating

threads i tried to find and weave through the stories i have told in my book. as i was mentioning, the feeling that i get here, the palpable feeling of being in a place where washington stood and henry knox stood with him, really does connect to that personal history. for all too many people, i hear it all the time, it is so boring. a lot of dates. but history is about what real people do.

walt whitman, somber poet of the civil war, who served as a volunteer nurse, once said the real war will never get in the books. and i have had that in my mind for many years, and certainly as i wrote "the hidden history of america at war." these are the stories about real people. this is the real war getting in the books. the story in "the hidden history of america at war" is the story of who fights our battles, who goes to war for us, and why we go to war. those are questions we should be asking ourselves. i do this by talking about six battles in american history. from the battle of yorktown to fallujah in 2004.

230 years of american history told through the lens of six battles. i have tried to get behind the stories your schoolbook left out, the hidden history. certainly, in the story of yorktown, which i will focus on tonight, that is the essence of what we all learned in the school books. that george washington won the battle of yorktown. that is true. the supreme moment of triumph. what they did not tell you and i will talk to you about is how washington did that. first of all, he did not do it alone. he had the help of the french navy and army, which was larger than any other army on the battlefield. he had the help of african-american soldiers. very important to start with the

story of yorktown. one of the other pieces of the story i would like to expand on is what happened after the battle of yorktown was over, when washington recovered 5000 or 6000 african-american slaves with the british that day during the battle. these included 17 people from mount vernon, washington's own plantation, and two dozen from jefferson's plantation. he made sure they were returned as property that belonged to people in the state. this is the side of the story that is important to understand and the side of the story that gets left out of schoolbooks and is all too important to understand these days. let's go back to that moment in philadelphia, when washington is standing around in a blue

uniform, and word comes down in april, 1775, congress had adopted militiamen who had been fighting the british. they are going to become the first continental army. they raise a company of riflemen from a few other states so this would be a truly united states army. the question is, who is going to take command? washington certainly had his own ambitions and ideas in his blue uniform. another gentleman also had ambitions to lead the army named john hancock. we do not think of john hancock as a great military leader, and he was not. he led the militia in training in massachusetts. here is john hancock, expecting

his good friends john adams and samuel adams -- after all, he and samuel adams escape the british on that day in 1775. he was quite sure samuel adams would put his name in nomination to command the army. well, john adams gets there first and suggests it should be george washington who leads the army. hancock's face, the records show his jaw truly dropped. samuel adams seconds the nomination. it was unanimous quickly. hancock and adams never got along well after that. it was a fracture they never got over. it is part of the idea that ambition and ego, all those things that play a part in politics and life today, were just as true of the founding fathers. they all had ambition, ego,

agendas. that is the story i love to find and tell. when we get to yorktown, 1775, washington goes to cambridge in july, taking with him a young gentleman named billy lee, who did not wear a uniform. he was wearing the servant's livery. he was a slave that stayed with washington every day of the revolution, through the disappointments and disasters and defeats. valley forge, he shivered with no uniform. lee is watching all of this. we have this great contradiction of washington leading the fight for liberty and freedom and equality, yet keeping a man in slave bondage every step of the

way. it is a contradiction we have to discuss and talk about. so we shift to six years later. yorktown is over. washington has won the war. but who did actually win the war? who won the revolution? we say the americans. but in american history and days like patriots' day or flag day, the minutemen get most of the credit. the embattled farmers. they shouldered their muskets as soon as the alarm bells rang, ready in a minute to run off,

drop their farm tools and apron and beat back the mighty redcoats with the shot heard 'round the world. then they enter the patriotic postwar legend as populist heroes who secured america's liberty and the right to bear arms. back to that in a minute. it is a grand story and one to feel proud of. but like most schoolbook history conjured up two centuries ago, it is as much mythology as myth. the history of the revolution will be a continued lie from one end to the other. there is no argument that the locals who rushed out to lexington performed heroically. but it is a small piece of a much larger story.

after the revolution is over, politicians were eager to flatter voters -- imagine that. politicians who want to flatter voters by promoting militia, the minutemen, as the part-time citizen soldiers, over the regulars of the continental army that washington had formed who had done most of the fighting and suffering. so this idea that militia men win the war is a story woven together by politicians and historians ever since. it is a myth rooted in a very deep distrust for standing armies. that america's founding generation had. it carried over for many years into the way we saw soldiers in this country and the way we treated them, both during the war and afterwards. that is one of the things i focus on most in the book -- how do we treat the men, for most of our history, and certainly women now -- who wear the uniform and

do the fighting? the question of who actually fought was an urgent one for washington when he takes over in 1775. he saw 15,000 men wandering around, disorderly, disorganized. they did not know how to dig trenches for latrines. he saw enlisted men voting on who would be their officers. he came out of the british military tradition and knew this was not going to do. but he was frightened of the idea that he would have to defeat the british army, perhaps the most powerful military force at the time, with these amateur, disorganized, and ill trained men. some of whom were black with

guns. he was going to put a stop to that as well. washington was not going to allow blacks to enlist in his continental army, at least in the beginning. by 1776, he was really concerned about the army and wrote to congress, to place any dependence upon the militia is resting on a broken staff. not the picture of the brave minutemen, is it? after his defeat a little later in 1776 right here in new york, thomas paine said, the summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from service. his summer soldier and sunshine patriot, these were the militia men, eager to head home. they were summer soldiers. signed on for a few months.

they would go off for a while and had to get back to the harvest. this was not going to do for washington. he was right, of course, paine. following that first blush of patriotic fervor, places like lexington had trouble rounding up a quota of citizen soldiers willing to serve. the performance of the militias, the citizen soldiers, so-called minuteman, was often unreliable, amateurish or worse. recruitment was troubled in rhode island. they could not get enough men to reach enlistment quotas. so they created a rhode island regiment, a group of emancipated slaves given their freedom in exchange for service, and their owners were compensated.

this was something washington very slowly agreed to. he knew he needed more bodies in his army, so he was willing to accept this one outstanding example of african-americans serving. he did not want to make it a nationwide issue. he knew that southern slaveholders, fellow slaveholders from south carolina and georgia and virginia were not going to agree to the idea of arming blacks. at the other end of the scale from the black soldiers being emancipated from slavery were the militias in places like virginia, where men were afraid to leave their homes to defend their state because they were afraid, if they left, their slaves would leave.

militias in places like virginia had really terrible service records during the war. thomas jefferson learned this in 1781 when he was chased out of richmond by a british army led by none other than benedict arnold. isn't history wonderful? benedict arnold in virginia with handcuffs for thomas jefferson. they did not tell you that in my school books. the revolution, in other words, was won by an army that is not the one depicted in the paintings we have. a frenchman in 1781 writes, it is truly incredible that troops almost naked, composed of old men and children and negroes, should behave so well under fire. it simply would not do to have the story of america's freedom won by a selection of out of

work teenagers, recent immigrants, including the german and irish, who were detested because they were catholic, and african americans. i will point out -- i am so glad i'm here to talk about this tonight -- that lafayette is on display. he is a major figure in the first chapter about yorktown and washington's men. lafayette, one of the idealists of the revolution, was completely devoted to the idea of abolition and emancipation. i am thrilled there is a lafayette display. i urge you to learn more about this extraordinary character, who was such a hero in our nation's creation. back to the idea of the minuteman myth, the noble idea that part-time soldiers had won americans' freedom -- it was soon carved in stone. why?

they are a threat to freedom. thomas jefferson, who was chased out of town by an army when the militia would not stand up for him, said in the same year that the army and navy would lead to a military expense, making the european laborer go supperless to bed. he did not want to pay for an army. these men had seen what kings could do. they knew the history of rome and what an ambitious leader with an army could do. their mistrust emerged throughout the revolution in ways that the men who fought were treated both after the revolution and its aftermath. in 1783, as the british are

getting ready to leave, officers in newburgh are unhappy. they have not gotten paid, have not gotten the pensions. to washington's credit, he goes up to newburgh and suppresses the newburgh conspiracy. in june of 1783, a couple hundred men in harrisburg are upset because they have not been paid, so they march on philadelphia, where congress was meeting. they stopped at a few of the tickling houses, so they were well oiled by the time they reached congress. alexander hamilton, he is arguing that the men should be paid, they should get their pensions. it is falling on deaf ears. these soldiers force alexander

hamilton and the rest of congress to flee to princeton nearby. a few years later, angry farmers in massachusetts who are very upset because they lost the right to vote, have not had a pension, lost their farms to unfair taxes in massachusetts, they rise up and threatened to take over the state armory in springfield, massachusetts. this was known as shay's rebellion. the rebellion is eventually put down. at that moment, it convinces men like washington and james madison that the country needs a better government and better constitution. certainly, that was one of the

key elements in forcing congress to call a constitutional convention in 1787. when they do that, when they begin their debate in philadelphia, the question for a need of america's army is front and center. the constitution was being discussed in 1787. james madison warned -- was really serious -- he did not like the idea of a standing army. he said it would be a standing military force with an overgrown executive that will not be a safe companion to liberty. a famous massachusetts politician, eldbridge gerry, he spoke to many of the founders and mockingly compared a standing army to -- how can i say this delicately? the male member. he said it was a dangerous

invitation to foreign adventure. that was his view about having an army. that derision and fear of a standing army permeated many of the founding fathers' ideas, along with their frugality. they were cheapskates. after the war was over, the army was reduced to 800 men. it did not work out well for their first wars with native americans. this has led to a long tradition in this country of paying lip service to america's fighting forces with a simplistic, cherry tree version of history that we teach our children and tell ourselves. there is a nearly daily cascade of stories of scandal, neglect. it is a very long history of the

way we treat the men and women who fight and wear the nation's uniform. since the nation was born, soldiers have gotten the short end of the stick. in the revolution, washington had to beg for troops to be fed, for cloth, for boots, ammunition. in a letter from valley forge, he says, one of my servants is nearly naked. probably was not himself. probably had a good uniform. presumably, the naked servant is william lee i mentioned. in the civil war, the word "shoddy" became used to describe union uniforms. right up to iraq, where they

have trucks and equipment, even, to our men and women as they serve. america has always talked a good game about honoring its troops but rarely delivered on the promise. in the aftermath of world war i, when the veterans bureau was created to handle the immense medical needs of returning doughboys, it was born in scandal. a first member of the cabinet was actually sent to prison for fraud and corruption. the current disgrace at v.a. hospitals, suicides, homelessness, drug abuse, posttraumatic stress disorder, all these issues amongst veterans are very much modern vestiges of the founders' deep disdain for when they called

"men of the blade." so on flag day or memorial day or veterans day, go down with them. history is observed. we like to thank our troops in the airport for their service. we have the flyovers at the stadium these days, which the army has paid for. the nfl teams have accepted money, which is another scandal. but these simplistic thank yous for service are rooted in a fake, populist pride that goes back to the time of the revolution. let's acknowledge there is a mistrust that led to the elevation of the minuteman myth to the great american gospel. let's tell a real story.

that is what i have tried to do in "the hidden history of america at war." it is the stories of the mostly men who have fought for us. it is the story of african americans who served, usually without recognition. it is a story of their service in the civil war, the second chapter of the book, which is about petersburg, when the colored troops were first allowed to fight and usually given tasks like burying the dead or being in the most forward position, certainly being paid less than their fellow white servicemen. after the war, they became buffalo soldiers. these are the real stories. a fascinating piece of the buffalo soldier story in the

third chapter is about balangiga in the philippines. most people have forgotten why we were in the philippines in the first place. one of the things the army did was bring buffalo soldiers from the west to florida to send them to cuba to fight because they believed that african-american soldiers were resistant to tropical diseases. this was an idea that went back to slave times when people believed they would not get tropical diseases. the death rates from yellow fever and malaria had nothing to do with being immune from disease because you are african-american. these are the stories that permeate america at war. it is part of the story i try to tell in this book. it is also a history of past to present. one of the things i discovered as i wrote the very last chapter, which is about the war in iraq and, specifically, the battle for fallujah, is that the

marines that went into fallujah went in with bayonets fixed. that may not seem surprising except it is 2004 and we have the most high-tech army in the world with drones and cyber warfare. these marines go into the city to retake a hardscrabble iraqi city with fixed bayonets. on that night, when george washington orders an assault at yorktown in october, 1781, he tells alexander hamilton and the marquis de lafayette, that he wants the men to go in with cold

steel. he wants these two british outposts taken without firing any shots. to be done in silence, to do it quickly with hand-to-hand combat. i was struck by the extraordinary contrast between washington ordering those men in in 1781 and the marines in fallujah in 2004, exactly the same way. so much has changed over those 230, almost 240 years, but some things do not change. the way that men go to war has remained the same. that is what this book is ultimately about, asking questions. who fights our battles? why do we go to war? what is a good war? i start out with a quote from benjamin franklin saying, in 1783, around the time washington is saying farewell here, there was never a good war or a bad peace. part of what i try to explore in this book is whether franklin is right or not.

are there good wars, bad peaces? i believe he is incorrect. i think there have been good wars. they are few and far between. certainly, the most important thing we can do as citizens is ask the questions. but we cannot ask the questions unless we know the real story. and that is why these stories of what these men did throughout our history are so important for us to learn and understand. thank you very much. [applause] mr. davis: if i may, i really like questions. i hope we can have some here tonight. i asked questions in the books that are as rudimentary as what did the declaration of independence declared?

why is there a statue of john wilkes booth? i would be happy to explain, but history is about asking questions and getting questions. i would welcome any questions. because we have c-span here, we want to hear the questions. please raise your hand if you have a question, comment. right behind you? >> big fan. i'm one of the teenagers who read your book. mr. davis: you make me feel so old. >> sorry. the first chapter is the revolution, the second is civil

war. you talk about bad wars and good wars. 1812 and the war of mexico -- can you talk about that? mr. davis: which six battles did i choose and why did i leave others out? there are six battles. yorktown. petersburg. civil war. i write about that because it is one of the overlooked. we know about gettysburg, atlanta burning, antietam. petersburg gets overlooked. it is unfortunate for a number of reasons. it really is the final point at which we and grant are battling

face to face. it is the story of the people of petersburg caught between two warring armies. the fact they were starving as this nearly year-long siege goes on. it is a fascinating story of what war does to people affected by it. the third chapter is the war in the philippines, the spanish-american war, an obscure war for most americans today. i was particularly drawn to the story because the water cure was a form of enhanced interrogation. prisoners were laid on the ground. water was poured down there throat until they were basically drowning. sounds like waterboarding, but it was happening in the philippines 100 years ago. this is not a story, digging into vast, secret documents. this was a controversy that reached all the way to the white house, was the subject of a senate hearing while roosevelt was in his first term in the white house. if we want to talk about learning from history, we have to understand history. the story of the philippines and what happened there, young americans being sent to a jungle in asia at the turn of the 20th

century, committing atrocities, getting involved in torture, we can certainly learn a lot from the story, but we did not. the fourth story is a bit of a departure but fascinating, because it is the battle of berlin. that was left out of my schoolbooks and certainly the hollywood telling of stories. i learned about iwo jima, d-day, but not about the fall of the capital of germany, perhaps the most significant event of world war ii, because it leads to the

death of hitler and the end of the thousand-year reich. we do not hear about it because the soviets did it. when the war was over, the soviets were no longer our allies but our enemy. that whole chapter about what happened in berlin gets left out of so many history books just as the role of the soviets is very unfamiliar to many americans, who are surprised to learn that approximately 27 million people in russia died during what we call world war ii and they call the great patriotic war. we had a celebration of the 70th anniversary of victory in europe day. there were old planes that flew over washington dc. the same day, in moscow, 500,000 people carried pictures of people who had died in the war. it is a very salient part of their history and part of their history we have to understand when we look at what is going on in russia today. we talk about learning from history, but if we do not know it, we cannot learn it. the story of berlin is ghastly

because of the extraordinary mass rape that took place of german women in retribution for what the germans had done to russian women when they invaded russia. this is the horrible side of war that we often leave out of movies and history books. the other aspect of berlin that is so important -- there was tension right away. soviet soldiers were shot by americans in a number of instances. the cold war, that was about to begin, really begins in berlin in 1945. that is a piece of hidden history i try to bring out. the last chapters are much more contemporary. the story of hue during the tet offensive.

hue gets overlooked. it was the citadel city, the home of the emperor for a long time. it has really been spared from most of the fighting in the indochina war. but in tet, 1968, all hell breaks loose. walter cronkite in new york hears the teletype machines chattering and says, what is going on? i thought we were winning the war. the pentagon had been telling him that there was a light at the end of the tunnel. walter cronkite, who was a veteran of world war ii, as a correspondent, got his flak jacket and uniform out to go to vietnam to look at what is going

on. you may be old enough to remember that february night in 1968 that walter cronkite told america we were losing the war. after that, lyndon johnson decided not to run again. one of the general lessons of vietnam was not to let television cameras on the battlefield. that is the story in that chapter, how reporters became much of the story. and finally, fallujah, a story which has not ended. when marines left in 2004, they do not think the city would fall 10 years later to forces related to al qaeda now called isis. that is a very quick overview of 230 years of military history.

i left some wars out and could have chosen others. but i chose these battles because each was emblematic of something important in the nation's history in its relationship with the military and how we see the people who fight, how the military has changed. it has really only been since 1960, when eisenhower left and gave a farewell address, that we had a warning of the military-industrial complex. until world war ii, americans had fought wars, gone back to business. but world war ii, obviously, changed that with the creation of what roosevelt called the "arsenal of democracy." it has changed forever. that is something we have to understand. too many of us do not have a connection to the military anymore.

we read the stories and brush them off, but that is a roundabout answer to your question. somebody else? >> i have a question. going back to yorktown, one of the myths i grew up with was that cornwallis was somehow incompetent in his dealings. later on, i learned cornwallis was venerated and accomplished in the european theater. where do you stand on that? mr. davis: he certainly was a veteran with all the honors. but he did not do a very good job in the south from about 1780

on. he and clinton, the commander in chief of british forces in north america here in new york, were at each other's throats. when you talk about backbiting or fighting, deciding he does not know what he is talking about, all that happened in the revolution too. cornwallis was an honored and decorated veteran but did not perform well when he came to america in the american south. the fact he was really allowed to get trapped on this really small peninsula, where the french navy was crucial in the battle of yorktown, was able to cut him off and allow washington's army and the french army to come in and start a siege, was a terrible, terrible strategic disaster cornwallis would be blamed for.

he would blame clinton for not sending enough troops. they would write angry letters for the rest of their lives, but he was really to blame. just as other generals in our history have gone back-and-forth about mistakes in american history. it was not his promised moment. interestingly, though, he goes back to england on the same boat that takes benedict arnold back to england. what conversations the two of them must have had. and benedict arnold's role in the revolution is a fascinating. arnold had been truly one of the

heroes of the early american revolution. again, ambition, ego, pride, feeling like he is passed over at every turn, he is wounded at saratoga. very important battle. still leads a charge that helps turn the tide of battle. when the time came to honor those who fought at saratoga, they put up statues and left a niche empty. someone felt arnold's heroism should be marked. there is a marble boot at saratoga. it does not say it is arnold's, but it is. he was wounded in his leg that day and never walked properly. that is why there is a statue of arnold's boot. fascinating character study of this man who was close to washington. washington trusted him. but he and his very ambitious and young wife had other ideas about what would happen. again, i would love to be on the

boat ride to hear what the two of them talked about. there are lots of hands. >> over here? mr. davis: then right in the back after that. >> a minuteman at great ridge who fought with lafayette on the way down to charleston and camden, he was in yorktown. in general, i am supportive of the approach to consideration of the continentals, a large percentage of whom were immigrants. pennsylvania, new york, 50% of the soldiers were foreign-born.

one of the questions i have, i do not know if your book gets to it, was the payment to the enlisted men. we know they got paid in largely worthless scrip bought up by speculators and later redeemed. we also know that newburgh conspiracy was about taking care of the officers. the officers did get taken care of. the enlisted men did not get pensions until much later. i wonder if you have comment. mr. davis: first of all, thank you very much for that. i want to add that i am not painting militia with -- you know, they are all a bunch of cowards. certainly, many performed admirably and heroically. there are cases of that that i document.

the men in harrisburg were enlisted men who marched on philadelphia because they had not been paid and wanted pensions. i mention also that, in 1781, early in 1781, washington is desperate. he has mutinies. at least two massive mutinies. first among the men of the pennsylvania line. he negotiates with them and sells that. then some men from new jersey, who also apparently stopped by the tickling house, also rebel. washington sends in troops to put this one down and has the ringleaders of that mutiny executed by firing squad. he puts some of the mutineers in

the firing squad, expected to execute the leaders of the rebellion. there are many other cases of this happening. i mention the extraordinary shay's rebellion, men who were expecting pensions and needed them, leading to the constitutional convention. one story stands out for me, and i told the story because i write about joseph plumb martin. he was a kid who enlisted at 16 and served through the entire war. much later in life, he wrote an account of that anonymously. it came out under the name of "a yankee doodle dandy." this is the real account we have of a grunt's-eye view. joseph plumb martin went to

maine and struggled getting his pension and lived on the property of henry knox. knox throws him off the property because he says it is not his property. joseph plumb martin dug the trenches that knox put cannons in in yorktown. later, they are arguing and knox throws him off his land. knox died choking on a chicken bone. not to say there is justice. just a curiosity that a man who survived the revolution dies choking on a chicken bone in serious debt because things have

not turned out well for him. it is just the same story, again, about how the fighting man, the revolutionary soldier, was usually not taken care of. i am sure you know the expression "not worth a continental." soldiers were paid with continental paper money, which was not worth a continental. >> when washington addressed the troops at newburgh, the meeting house is still there. when he addresses the troops, wasn't there a bit about him pausing and taking out his spectacles? mr. davis: he said, i've never had to use these, but i am getting old and my eyes are getting bad. very poignant moment. there were many moments of washington's officers, here, that they wept.

that is a tribute to the love and devotion they had for him. the fact he put the conspiracy down is a reflection of the degree of love and affection. i am getting the high sign here. i do not know if we have time for more questions. thank you very much for coming. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> american history tv is featuring first ladies, influence and image, and 8:00 p.m. eastern throughout the rest of the year. cn