The Boston Massacre: A Family History

Those of you who’ve been hanging out here in the Margins for a while know that I love books that turn what we think about a historical subject upside down, or at the very least expand it. Historian Serena Zabin does both in The Boston Massacre: A Family History. Paul Revere’s iconic engraving of the…

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Mrs. Wright’s Guard

One of the recurring themes in accounts of the home front in war—any war—is the formation of a home guard, official or unofficially. It is usually described as being made up of the men and boys who were left behind because they were too old, too damaged or too young to join the army. That…

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