Walter Nugent, Gordon S. Wood's The American Revolution

The history of the American Revolution, colonial American and British influence is often debated and interpreted by many historians in they own points of view, these historians like Walter Nugent, Gordon S.Wood and Niall Ferguson hold American and British History in very high regard within their history book varying from one side to another. Niall’s book the “Empire” wrote not from a typical American perspective but that of the British and it considers half a millennium of some of the most momentous events throughout American and world history. Wood’s book “The American Revolution” lays out all of the events and explains the ideology brought about the desire for independence and his document splits in two chapters in details talks about crisis …show more content…
Ferguson’s document starts off and only reviews of chapter two dubbed White plague. The British Empire’s origins, he described the British as the “white plague” of colonization. This massive migration of British and Europeans chiefly seeking economic freedom rather than the religious freedom is what made and allowed the British Empire to continue existing. The chapter called plantation, does not speak about the crops, nor is he referring to slaves or workers that work them but rather focused on the potential agriculture in the American colonies, those who owned it and how much of it and the troubles of colonist given by the Native American population who were referred to as “weeds”.pg48 “Empire”. In the Chapter White and Black, He does not start right off the bat with perspective of indentured servants nor slavery of the African people but rather talks about the rapid emigration of British, Europeans and indentured servants from their native homelands to the colonies. Only on page 62 that he begins to bring up the mass exportation of African slaves to the Caribbean’s isles due to the high mortality rates of working the sugar and tobacco plantations, in later pages he talks about the horrendous treatment and conditions on the slave ships like the Argyle; where slaves packed together in small spaces, were in state of poor hygiene and inadequately fed. He talks briefly towards the end of this …show more content…
Gordon Wood writer of the “The American Revolution” he outlined the events that had brought about America’s independence and helped the reader to grasp the difficulty that into creating it by describing the key events and making use of statistical information. Gordon uses information correctly but only goes briefly in the historical affairs of British Empire. Niall Ferguson’s “The Empire”, chapter dubbed the “White Plague” explores the extent of the British influence on the world but mostly the North America, while the colonies were used as a means to gain land to settle and used it as a mean to produce sugar, tobacco plantations and used slaves as a cheap source of labor. He then goes on to talk about the American Revolution later but only for a few pages, he however does not take into the account the perspectives of the colonists. Walter Nugent’s “Habits of the Empire” first chapter “Trans-Appalachia” explains in detail how the colonists acquire land before, during and after the Revolution. He goes into little detail of land acquisition like Louisiana Purchase, Quebec Act and Proclamation Line of 1763. Walter Nugent takes a neutral side of the writings covering both side, American and British. I say that overall that these papers have been very informative in giving a perspective of the hardships that