Month: January 2022

Seven Years’ War – Battle scene (Barry Lyndon, 1975)

Flintlock musket demo (a British reenactor demonstrating top speed for re-loading a “British Brown Bess”-style flintlock musket & getting 3 shots off in 46 seconds)

Flintlock Loading (slower motion, FYI)

American Battlefield Trust – Bunker Hill (this organization has created many such 4-minute explainers, they’re all quite good)

Revolutionary War Battles, interactive maps and other resources from American Battlefield Trust

Mount Vernon, Yorktown Battle Animation (there’s also a Winter Patriot film covering the winter of 1776-1777 and the battles of Trenton and Princeton)

Watch and take notes on this 5-minute clip from the 2006 Spanish film Alatriste, depicting Spanish tercio (“pike and shot”) formations against French forces during the Battle of Rocroi in 1643, during the Thirty Years’ War. Rocroi was fought in the Ardennes region of northern France.

Questions to consider:

What equipment are the soldiers using?
What tactics does each side employ?
How do forces communicate on the battlefield?
How does this depiction differ from paintings made of the battle? For example …

In the late 1600s by Savuer Le Conte

Or in 1834 by Francois Joseph Heim

Links to Explore:

Jamestown Fort 1607 (Virginia)
Pequot War, 1636-1637 (Connecticut)
Overview of Iroquois Wars (“Beaver Wars”) 1640-1701 (Great Lakes Region / Eastern Canada)
Pueblo Revolt 1680, a firsthand account from the Spanish (present-day New Mexico)
Narrative of Mary Rowlandson, a New England Puritan captive during King Philips’ War 1675
Lachine Massacre, 1689 (Montreal, New France)

Hello and welcome to the course!

Our first class meeting will take place Tues, Jan 18 in Sullivan 314.

Please make sure you do the following in Week 1.

• Read the syllabus. Several times.
• Familiarize yourself with the Blackboard set-up and bookmark the course website.
• Obtain the textbook by Glatthaar, The American Military: A Concise History — from campus bookstore or rent/buy online.
• Download the 2-volume textbook, American Military History as free PDFs — see links in the sidebar or under “Getting Started” on Blackboard.
• Contribute to the Day 1 introduction discussion board by 11:59 pm on Jan 18.
• Read the assigned chapters for Jan 18 and 20. Take notes and define the syllabus terms as you read.
• Sign up to present 2 different chapters, on the Google spreadsheet linked on Blackboard and the course website, by Jan 21 at 11:59 pm.
• Got questions? Put them on the Troubleshooting discussion board, or email me at thangen@worcester.edu

Finally, yes — this class has a significant reading load. I’ve identified key terms in each chapter on the syllabus for each day, which should help you know what to look for as you read, and the peer chapter presentations starting next week will also help make sense of the readings. I’ll have more to say about how to read the textbooks in our early days together — don’t let the length of these books concern you too much at this point.