Why Did Neighbors Choose To Be A Patriot or Loyalist?

How Neighbor History Can Help Answer Questions about the 250th Anniversary

The 249^th anniversary of the 4^th of July is upon us, one more day to go. For me the 4^th represents an interesting family history question, that I don’t think I’m ever going to answer if I don’t use techniques in Neighbor History research to address them.

One of my ancestors was a loyalist, who fought in the Battle of Saratoga, and went on to live and die in Canada. His other relatives were patriots. And I wonder why he chose the side he did, why did he choose exile?

Did he make an oath and decided to keep it. Did his close family, his wife, influence him? Or was it friends, neighbors who influenced him? The loyalist lived in a highly active revolutionary area. He attended college. Could that college experience have influenced him on the path he took? Or was it religion, he was a congregationalist early in his life but seemed to have ended as a methodist or Anglican. Did a religious leader and his faith influence him?

The Declaration of Independence next to the King’s diary

Neighbor history’s framework asks us to not follow the ancestor but to look to neighbors, look to classmates and members of the congregation, to look to community and religious leaders. To look to the military they were enlisted in, to look to fellow soldiers and officers and their lives.

By following the neighbors you’ll be much more likely to fill in the whole story of the experiences of a group of connected people. Not every distant ancestor wrote a diary. But someone amongst the group of neighbors certainly might have. And when you read letters, diaries and laws related to the very time your relatives and neighbors lived you’ll far better understand the context of what was happening.

Following your ancestor can blinker your research into following just one individual. With neighbor history, you have the permission to wander. But also because of the vastness of the enterprise, you can talk and correspond with other researchers who are researching those neighbors and collaborate. That ability to correspond and discuss neighbor history with today’s neighbors is important. Every time I’ve done so, the discussion and it’s influence on my thinking provides another idea and gem, and I make a connection that’s worth keeping and learning a lot in the process. I see my journey as parallel and connected with my neighbors today; we are each learning history from one another.

The research becomes less about why my ancestor made the choice he made, and more about why the people at the time made the decisions they made. What was the context of what was happening at the time. Answers to those questions will help you put your ancestors, or if you are solely focused on Neighbor History, just the neighbors at the time in context.

Neighbor history isn’t a lonely pastime, the concept is to go out and talk to your neighbors about the history of the town, the history of the religious institution, the history of migration, and history of the regiment. And the best way to talk to them is to work on a joint project together. Share research to help fill in gaps and speed the process. Author an article together. Join the local historical society and propose a project and ask for volunteers. Such collaborations will produce better results than a lonely pursuit and will be much more fun in the process.

The chance to talk about history with others and together work on projects will I have no doubt progress your research. And for historical associations, who are ramping up their 250 celebrations as they think about the next 12 months. It’s a chance to have the community help with research.

More family historians and genealogists will want to know what their ancestors did during the revolutionary period of the 4^th of July, just as the community of the town’s neighbors will want to know what was done during the revolution. Consider having your association posing that question I started with, why did the people of 1775 choose to be a Patriot or a Loyalist? What influenced them to make the decision? Was it family, neighbors, a chance for freedom, or a religious leader? And what were the consequences of the decision?

By building Neighbor History projects around these very questions. Perhaps grant supported; and there’s never a better time to ask for a grant. You can seek to answer those questions and bring today’s neighbors whether they had ancestors who were involved or not to help your community answer those questions.

This question for me, about my ancestor’s choice Loyalist over Patriot. It’s been an enigma. There are no written records, or letters stating the reasons he made the choices he made. When his friends, relatives and especially neighbors made other choices. And his decision had huge consequences for him and his family. It was exile to Canada, loss of property, friends and relatives divided.

He and his family made the choice but without written confirmation what did he and his family did. Looking to his neighbors might be the best hope of determining why those choices were made.

Want to read more? The piece continues with insights into the six types of Neighbor History evidence, with accompanying infographics and examples using our loyalist case study. The research and model provide a roadmap for what to research why a loyalist would make the choices they did. Which can also be used for patriots. Subscribe to read on, if not I wish you a happy 249^th 4^th of July!