Trusted Writing on History, Travel, and American Culture Since 1949
SEARCH 75 YEARS OF ESSAYS!
Andrew Jackson
Presidential candidates stayed above the battle until William Jennings Bryan stumped the nation in 1896; they’ve been in the thick of it ever since
The most confident prediction that can be made about the 1980 presidential campaign is that the nominees will invest enormous energy, time, and money in stumping the country.
“It is astonishing that the murderous practice of duelling should continue so long in vogue,” said Benjamin Franklin. Yet continue it did, often with peculiarly American variations
Few boys survive their school days without using their fists now and then. If these fights are extemporaneous affairs, fought in the immediate heat of anger, they are little more than animal reflex actions.
The revival in the nineteenth century of medieval motifs in architecture extended from villas and furniture to farmhouses and vineries
Many of the visitors who admire the classic calm of Monticello would be startled if they knew of the original intentions of Thomas Jefferson.
It was a bright day for the Republic, that afternoon of May 15, 1815, when the U.S.S. Constitution victoriously dropped anchor oil the Battery at New York.
The American system of choosing a President has not worked out badly, far as it may be from the Founding Fathers’ vision of a natural aristocracy
Martin Van Buren, Andrew Jackson’s right-hand man, was a master of political intrigue who let nothing block his one unwavering ambition—the Presidency. But sometimes he was too smart for his own good
Did the Battle of Fayal really have an impact on the Battle of New Orleans 3,000 miles away?
Historians disagree about how crucial the battle of Fayal was to Jackson’s victory at New Orleans. Those of the nineteenth century, among them Benson Lossing, generally agreed with Jackson’s sentiments, quoted at the beginning of Mr. Baker’s article.
A lonely, gallant battle fought by the designer of our flag set the stage for Andrew Jackson's victory at New Orleans.
The Corps is supposed to be tough, and is. This often confounds its enemies and sometimes irritates the nation’s other services
Without doubt they were Washington, who walked carefully within the Constitution, and Lincoln, who stretched it as far as he dared
Andrew Jackson challenged Thomas Hart Benton in a bloody frontier brawl, but they later formed a political team which left its mark on America.
As the chanting of his slaves announced the approaching death of Andrew Jackson, on a June day in 1845, the old warrior spent part of his last conscious moments dictating farewell messages to men whose love he had valued—Francis P.
Over 350 years a mighty pageant of history has moved through the myth-haunted valley of the “Great River of the Mountains”
Andrew Jackson won a stunning victory over a veteran British army that would eventually propel him to the White House
On August 24 and 25, 1814, British forces were in full possession of Washington; from August 29 to 31 other forces held Alexandria. From September 11 to 14 they were feeling out the defenses of Baltimore. Then the greater part of them vanished out of sight; once the British ships were over the horizon there was almost no means of knowing where they were and far smaller means of knowing what they intended, for by this time the blockade of the Atlantic Coast was highly effective, and there were few ships to bring in news even of the outside world, certainly not of the movements of the British lleet. No one could even be sure that any further offensive movement was meditated, but it was the duty of the American government to act on the hypothesis that the enemy would attempt to do all the harm possible —and that implied that British movements must be foreseen and guarded against.
The third in a series on TIMES OF TRIAL IN AMERICAN STATECRAFT
Old Hickory's attack on Biddle's bank had some unexpected consequences
Editor's Note: Bray Hammond wrote this essay for American Heritage in 1956 and developed it into Banks and Politics in America from the Revolution to the Civil War, for which he won the Pulitzer Prize for history in 1958.
Featured Authors
