Do British schools teach the American Revolution?

I don't know what they think about the Revolution, but from what I understand they don't even really know about the War of 1812. Probably because they were fighting Napoleon, therefore had much bigger things to worry about

Nice to hear British are teaching em.
And also nice to see it sounds like no British historians describe American Founding father as "criminals, activists, treasoners, propagandasts, and even terrorists," which some of Japanese historians are doing when they describe "Korean Independent Activists."

History is very subject anyhow. But, "American revolution" is one of the major historical and human achievements in terms of the fact that human first developed democratic government elected by people of that states or nations.

I'm Australian, but I have a friend from Britain, and I have asked him this very question.

Apparently the American War of Independance was brought about over the complaints of hypocritcal slave-owners who had the nerve to moan about a lack of "liberty", and who were upset about the fact that the good British under King George had passed laws reserving lands for the Native Americans (thus preventing the plantation owners from using the land), and the Americans' unwillingness to pay for some tea, which even when taxed was far cheaper than any other source, and note that this was the only thing that was being taxed.

The British were quite justified in sending in an army to restore order to these upstarts (my friend used a very different word here, that for the sake of decency I won't repeat), and its a damn shame they got beaten, for the world would have been a far better place with the British Empire in full swing than with the Americans on top of the heap.

So goes the opinion of my friend, who is, for the record, interested in history and has a keen sense for current events.

There are two sides to every story.

fledse said:

Nice to hear British are teaching em.
And also nice to see it sounds like no British historians describe American Founding father as "criminals, activists, treasoners, propagandasts, and even terrorists," which some of Japanese historians are doing when they describe "Korean Independent Activists."

History is very subject anyhow. But, "American revolution" is one of the major historical and human achievements in terms of the fact that human first developed democratic government elected by people of that states or nations.

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To keep going with my anonymous British friend's opinion, the British had been democratically electing a parliament for quite a while. And there have certainly been other examples of elected governements, going back through history to take a look at the Republic of Venice, and all the way back into Ancient History with the Roman Republic and the Athenian Democracy.

The establishment of a republican government for the US was indeed a great thing, but lets not make it out to be more than it was, something we do with a lot of grand achievements. Alexander the Great did not conquer the entire known world of his time, and the US was not the first country ever to democratically elect its leaders.

Technically, the Founding Fathers were traitors, terrorists, criminals, and all the other things you have mentioned. They knew that they were, and fully expected to be hanged as such if the whole enterprise failed, as subjects of British Law who had wantonly broken said law. We can argue that they morally in the right to act as they did, and that could go either way, but the fact is that they were breaking the law.

DIVUS IVLIVS said:

Technically, the Founding Fathers were traitors, terrorists, criminals, and all the other things you have mentioned. They knew that they were, and fully expected to be hanged as such if the whole enterprise failed, as subjects of British Law who had wantonly broken said law. We can argue that they morally in the right to act as they did, and that could go either way, but the fact is that they were breaking the law.

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Technically speaking, the traitor, criminal, etc. appellations only apply if you are on th losing side. If you are victorious you become a hero, a liberator, a Founding Father, or whatever term you or history wishes to bestow. That is one of the constants of history. For example, what would Oliver Cromwell be called if he was on the losing side of the English Civil War?

The greatest crime a man can commit is treason against his lawful soverign; unless he wins.

But I am very interested in finding out what was the real root motivation of the American Revolution. I was taught, and they are probably still teaching, that the reason for the revolution was "Taxation without Representation".

However, as I got older, wiser (sic) and less naive, I realized that I am taxed fairly heavily and I do not feel that I have a real say in these taxes. But, my taxes are not too onerous and I do not think that the taxes on the American colonies were onerous or oppressive. And I am unwilling to take up arms because of my taxes, nor am I willing to send my children to the barricades for these taxes either.

From my viewpoint, taxation without representation is insufficient motivation to risk life and limb and all your possesions.

Hunger, starvation and other major economic shortfalls are sufficient reason for a revolution, which were among the primary motivations of the French and Russian revolutions. But this did not exist in America in the 1770's.

So I am at a loss to figure out how the Founding Fathers motivated the public into a revolution.

The slavery agenda presented earlier does not hold up to the light of day. Slaves were very rare in the revolutionary hotbeds of Boston and Philadelphia.

Anyone have any answers? I've got some theories, but that is all they are. The theories are economic, but they have a problem in that I still cannot figure out how they were applied so that the common man was motivated to commit treason.

cptJACK said:

I know we have a couple people from the UK here, and several Europeans at that.. Just wondering if other countries teach about the American Civil War, specifically in British Class Rooms.

Do they talk about the bravery of men like Washington and Jefferson like American schools do, or is it more of a "damn Yankees" kind of thing, where they are rebels fighting agaisnt the mother country?

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This is hard for me to answer,i am not British,so i never went to a British school.
But in Australia,most Aussie kids know the American 1st American presidents and the recent presidents more than the Aussie PrimeMinsiters,even the Aussie kids don't even know the 1st Aussie P/M.So i am guessing the same with England but not as worst as Australia.
It's been on the news a couple of years ago on how Aussie kids know more about America than Australia.

The British teaching of the War of Independence is definately different to the US.

In the US it's seen a major event, in Britain a very minor one, US was an insignificant colony by western hemisphere standards, compared to Canada and the Carribean let alone compared to Asian colonies.

The War itself was being fought the same time as other wars; Maharrathas, Holland and ongoing hostilities with France and Spain.

In America the war is idolised and its leaders canonised and attributed noble aims such as liberty and freedom and so on. In Britain it's regarded very pragmatically as war for greed by the leaders, it was a war over the demarcation line which forbade the US from grabbing Indian lands.

In the US the decisive French contribution is covered up, in Britain the decisive French intervention is ignored as much as possible.

I have a counter question. Do US schools teach any British history? ^^

DIVUS IVLIVS said:

Apparently the American War of Independance was brought about over the complaints of hypocritcal slave-owners who had the nerve to moan about a lack of "liberty", and who were upset about the fact that the good British under King George had passed laws reserving lands for the Native Americans (thus preventing the plantation owners from using the land), and the Americans' unwillingness to pay for some tea, which even when taxed was far cheaper than any other source, and note that this was the only thing that was being taxed.

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I don't think the southern colonies were an important enough factor to dictate colonial direction ( yes I know about Virginia), but as a whole it wasn't as the colonies were not closely bound to each other in the first place. I don't think slavery played such a key role in any decision to start a revolution.

To grab a line from another thread about revolutions, I think the four headed monster Coercive Acts & the Quebec Act were the sparks to ignite history.
I think the US Revolution should have a proper place in Brit history & if its not covered, then they need to explain how some of their soldiers died or made their fame.

Edratman said:

Anyone have any answers? I've got some theories, but that is all they are. The theories are economic, but they have a problem in that I still cannot figure out how they were applied so that the common man was motivated to commit treason.

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I think we have to give serious consideration to the idea that the common man associated themselves with the reasons given in the Declaration of Independence of 1776. They are 27 in number.

And if these do not seem sufficient in merit(or number) to justify "treason," then remember that only 1/3 of the English colonists supported it(with another third having no opinion and being willing to go along with things however they fell out - that's what we were taught in school anyway).

I can't but think that the presence of an ocean between the colonies and London lent a certain air of feasibility to the project in the minds of many. That never hurts.

Toltec said:

In America the war is idolised and its leaders canonised and attributed noble aims such as liberty and freedom and so on. In Britain it's regarded very pragmatically as war for greed by the leaders, it was a war over the demarcation line which forbade the US from grabbing Indian lands.

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Toltec, yes, your remark about the demarcation line which forbade the US from grabbing Indian lands is quite pertinent(in fact, it's alluded to in reason 27 above; He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare, is undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.). In my view, if it wasn't the "proximate" cause of the war, then it might as well have been.

As to the difference between the British and American methods of grabbing land, I think if I had been an Indian, I would have considered the British method marginally less odious if no less grabitudinal(grabilacious?)

I'm no Geo. Washington aficionado, but I recall (vaguely) that he too favored the Revolution as he had his eye on land grants ( Indian land ) that would have brought him a hefty coin.

As the old saying goes. The victors write the history books.

Scourge said:

As the old saying goes. The victors write the history books.

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Yep. History is written by the victors.

MrStoff1989 said:

Yep. History is written by the victors.

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i thought we would have this down by now

Yup the victors write a lot of history, so do the losers and the neutrals.

Trouble is only the victors read the victor's books, the loser's the loser's books and the neutrals the neutral's books.

As a European I can say that we do get teaching in the American revolution. In fact in Norway the revolution is glorified, maybe abecause it plays an important part of the norwegian revolution in 1814.

Juell said:

As a European I can say that we do get teaching in the American revolution. In fact in Norway the revolution is glorified, maybe abecause it plays an important part of the norwegian revolution in 1814.

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Thanks for that insight Juell.

To echo what was said about Norway, I think where the American Revolution is taught then it is part of a wider study of a period of revolution, starting with America and continuing through the French Revolution and so on.

The American revolution was not about democracy, in fact calling someone a 'democrat' at the time was a deep insult. Britain, and by extension the American colonies at the time, were governed by parliament. The founding fathers thought this a fine idea but resented the fact that they weren't doing the governing. However, you can't run around criticising the very form of government you want to impose with yourselves in charge; so you create the myth of a tyrannical monarch. Now, George III was many things but tyrant he couldn't be, he was a constitutional monarch with limited power subject to parliament but he became the focus of the revolutionary movement.

Anyway, as an aside, and I appreciate this gets confusing for some of you, there's no such thing as a 'British' school. The education system in Scotland is entirely different from that in England and Wales, which in turn differs from that in Northern Ireland. Each system has a different take on history, for example in England, they might study English monarchs stretching back to Alfred, whilst in Scotland we would pretty much ignore English kings, unless they have an impact on Scottish history, up until the union of the crowns with James II.