Amazon.com
Unwise Passions traces the trajectory of aristocrat Nancy Randolph's tempestuous life, beginning with her privileged birth in 1774, continuing through a series of scandals that eventually sent her North, and concluding with her death in 1837. But this engaging, accessible biography also serves as group portrait of the Virginia aristocracy--and of its declining fortunes, as the colonial oligarchy was supplanted by an unrulier democracy. When she was only 18, Nancy was accused of having borne a child to her own sister's husband, Richard Randolph, who then allegedly murdered the newborn. Defended by Revolutionary legend Patrick Henry, Richard and Nancy were acquitted, and she returned to live with him and her sister. But the rumors persisted, and Richard's sudden death in 1796 only made them uglier. Many of the ugliest rumors were voiced by Richard's younger brother, Jack; Nancy's former suitor. Jack improved the debt-riddled family estates while he pursued a political career as a fiery states-rights congressman (a career that gets nearly as much of the author's attention as Nancy's life). Virginia-based journalist Alan Pell Crawford doesn't conclude definitively whether or not Jack actually believed Nancy had murdered his brother and had sexual relations with a slave, but the congressman certainly hated her enough to throw her off the family farm and repeat those stories later to her husband. At age 34, reduced to poverty and living in New York, the long-suffering Nancy married Gouverneur Morris, another wealthy veteran of the Revolutionary generation. Their happy union produced one child and endured until his death. Crawford, also the author of Thunder on the Right, pens a lively narrative that vividly evokes his characters: kindhearted, rather frivolous Nancy; urbane, unshockable Morris; irascible, overwrought Jack; and a host of cousins who are scattered throughout America's inbred, gossipy high society. Good fun and good history, to boot. --Wendy Smith
Book Description
In the spring of 1793, eighteen-year-old Nancy Randolph, the fetching daughter of one of the greatest of the great Virginia tobacco planters, was accused, along with her brother-in-law, of killing her newborn infant. Once one of the loveliest and most sought-after young women in Virginia society, she was immediately denounced as a ruined Jezebel, and the great orator Patrick Henry and future Supreme Court justice John Marshall were retained to defend her in her sensational trial.
In the tradition of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, Alan Pell Crawford brings to life this gripping account of murder, infanticide, and prostitution charges, and of unimaginable treachery, moral decline, and great heroism played out in the intimate lives of this nation's Founding Fathers. It is the true story of the privileged and pampered children of the new country's aristocratic families as they struggle to find their place in an increasingly democratic America, where their values and position in society are under siege. Above all, it is the story of the indomitable Nancy Randolph, who is hounded out of Virginia by a scandal that will haunt her and everyone she loves for the rest of their lives.
In the early 1790s, after Nancy goes to live with her sister Judith and handsome brother-in-law Richard at their remote plantation, called Bizarre, rumors fly throughout Virginia that Nancy has given birth and Richard, knowing the child to be his, has killed it. After an inquest, Nancy is ordered off the plantation by her cousin John Randolph and, reduced to poverty, she must find her way in a new and forbidding world.
Eventually she flees to New York where she forms an unlikely alliance with the immensely rich Gouverneur Morris, a signatory of the Declaration of Independence. Meanwhile John Randolph, a protégé of Thomas Jefferson who becomes a notorious wit and controversial member of Congress, a duelist and a drug addict, spends most of his life campaigning against her. After Morris's death, Nancy must fight for her honor once again -- Morris's relatives are eager to have a piece of his estate and to see her disinherited.
American history at its richest, with a cast of characters including not only the haughty Randolphs, but Jefferson, Henry, Morris, and Marshall, Unwise Passions is as riveting and revealing as any current scandal -- in or out of Washington.
Customer Reviews:
Pretty good.......2006-08-27
I read a lot of biography and historical fiction and I was intrigued by the reviews of this book so I bought it. The print is large, there are many reproductions of paintings, and it's a rather quick read, but it's "pretty good" as far as historical biography goes. It was interesting to read a thumbnail sketch of the rise and fall of the Virginia tobacco farmers, and it was also a fun task to try and keep track of all of the Randalph's as they inter-married! The main problem that keeps the book from being truly wonderful is that the scandal and the main characters aren't very compelling to begin with and the author doesn't do much to infuse the story with any urgency. There a few points where I found myself wondering what would happen next, but for the most part I was simply mildly entertained and when I was finished I felt I'd read a decent book that further illuminated a period in American history for a me and also educated me about Nancy Randolph and her kinsmen.
Less engaging than a history textbook...from high school........2006-01-15
I enjoy historical fiction and historical fact, but I found this book to be quite dull. The writing was not engaging, as the style seemed antiquated to me. I think I was expecting more of a modern interpretation of the story. Instead, this book reads like a Victorian gossip column. In short, neither the story nor the "scandal" was intriguing to me, not even as simple history. Apparently enjoyable by some, but it just wasn't what I expected.
Great Biography...Not So Much Scandal.......2006-01-02
The title is a little misleading, but this is still a great biography of Anne Cary Morris. The "scandal" is dealt with in several chapters and the remaining story tells of the disfunctional family of which she was a part of. It left me looking for more information about the remaining "cast of characters."
Historical Reality Check of early Americans.......2005-11-16
I got the book at my local library and just completed it. Mr. Crawford is good writer. I like that the chapters are short and the story line keeps moving.
I see that he has a new book coming out on Jefferson's last years. The research from this book probably helped on the new one since the Randolph and Jefferson familes were related (cousins married cousins) and Jefferson's son-in-laws were also politicians. I really appreciated the family tree even though the larger family lines aren't complete.
The main story line was not really resolved for me unless we are to believe Nancy's response to Jack in their later years. Did Nancy deliberately abort with her cousin's "medicine" or did she really miscarry? Was Nancy really pregnant by Theodorick who died before she delivered and not his brother Richard? How could Nancy go about in society as she "increased" without any censorship and why didn't any of her relatives, especially her sister who lived in the same house, know about the pregnancy?
Some characters appear for only a few paragraphs yet interest me to find out more about them in other biographies or histories. I was surprised to see that President Adams was not liked and Jefferson was extremely political. Crawford shows the political parties switched platforms over time so current parties cannot claim ownership of ideas. I will be interested in reading more books about the early founders, politicians and other Americans. This taste of early years in congress was very interesting.
Great book about my ancestors!!.......2005-06-25
This is a totally awesome book. With a twisted tale and a ton of history you can't beat it. Plus reading about Nancy who is a distant cousin of mine, is very exsiting. I think anyone of any age will love this book. If you like colonial history and excitment you will really enjoy this one! :o)
Book Description
The story of Gouverneur Morris, the brilliant and unconventional Founding Father from New York, is a forgotten jewel in the crown of early American national history. Although he was an important contributor to our Constitution, Morris has generally received little respect or attention from historians. The reason for this long indifference lies primarily in the most powerful but misunderstood episode of Morris’s life: his experience as American minister to France during the height of the French Revolution. Envoy to the Terror is the first in-depth study of Morris’s time in France (1789-94), and it convincingly discredits many longstanding myths about his performance as a diplomat.
Morris arrived in Paris on business in 1789, just before the Revolution began. He quickly became involved in French politics and soon was advising not only the reformers, led by the Marquis de Lafayette, but King Louis XVI himself. His empathy for France deepened when he fell passionately in love with a beautiful aristocrat, and by the time of his appointment as U.S. minister he was too deeply enmeshed in French affairs to extricate himself. During the turbulent summer of 1792, Morris was involved in plots to help the king escape. When Louis was dethroned, Morris was the only diplomat to remain in Paris, and he coped single-handed with a flood of pleas for help from people in danger from the Terror.
Melanie Randolph Miller’s research reveals that, contrary to the charges of Morris’s contemporaries, which have been adopted by many historians, Morris conducted himself throughout one of history’s greatest cataclysms with superb diplomatic skill, compassion, and a determination to preserve French-American amity. While conventional wisdom has been that Morris was recalled due to misconduct and inability, this book establishes that it was instead the result of unfounded denunciations by secret adversaries, including Thomas Paine and John Adams’s son-in-law, who viewed Morris as an obstacle to their ambitions and schemes in France.
Envoy to the Terror brings to life the fascinating and dangerous intrigues of the French Revolution and provides a profound reinterpretation of Morris’s role in one of the most important periods of America’s early diplomatic history.
Customer Reviews:
Miller on Morris.......2006-08-23
An expansion and refinement of the author's Ph.D. dissertation on the diplomacy of Gouverneur Morris during very troubled times in Paris.
Gouverneur Morris was an intelligent man of solid good sense, with an obvious love for life. Dr. Miller, as befits one holding a law degree, writes as an advocate for the historical reputation of this important figure from our country's early days. In my opinion, she wins her case.
Anyone interested in the diplomatic efforts of our country in its infancy will enjoy this book.
I hope that the talented Dr. Miller will continue writing graceful books on equally interesting subjects.
Still Relevant Today.......2005-03-05
We learn to see our future by looking at our past, and contemporary French and American relations--as they relate to French censure for America's enlarging foreign policy and the U.S. zeal for "democratization" of the larger world--can be viewed in greater focus by narrowing in on the history of our two countries during the French Revolution and the French `Terror' that followed it. The American diplomat pivotal to this period-the only one on whom Washington could depend for analysis of what was happening abroad-was Gouverneur Morris, today one of the lesser known founding fathers, who as United States Minister to France from 1789-92, during the height of the atrocities taking place there, turned out to be profoundly perspicacious in seeing the terrible future of this, one of America's first adventures in `democracy building,' and its unpredictable, and sometimes terrible results. In Dr. Melanie Miller's insightful revisiting of the historical record of relations between the United States and France during this fateful and terrible period, as set down in her recent biography of Gouverneur Morris, Envoy to the Terror, Dr. Miller tells us much that is relevant to French and American relations today.
Revisionist View of Morris.......2005-02-11
This well-written and lively book should go a long way in restoring Gouverneur Morris to his rightful place among the Founding Fathers. The prickly Morris has had a pretty bad press over the years, but Envoy to the Terror provides a vigorous, in places brilliant, and ultimately convincing defense of Morris' conduct. Miller shows how Morris energetically defended America's interests under extraordinarily difficult circumstances and successfully disproves charges made both at the time and by later historians that his term as minister to France was a failure.
So you thought you knew the Founding Fathers. .......2005-02-09
Gouverneur Morris may be the virtually unknown, underrated key to understanding the American Revolution, and this exciting new book tells his story from a fresh viewpoint. Thorough-going scholarship combines with bright and lively prose to bring Morris to life and set the record straight on his role in the establishment of the American Experiment. Dr. Miller shows that the conventional view of Morris has been much too limited and is due for thorough revision. This study is much more thorough than the recent popularizing biography of Morris by Richard Brookhiser. If you liked that book, which acknowledges Miller's ground-breaking research, you should read this one to learn the whole story. This book is invaluable for serious students of the Revolutionary period.
Understanding Gouverneur: A Compelling Read.......2005-01-27
Gouverneur Morris has been a long underrated yet instrumental figure during important times. He took a critical part in the constitutional convention in Philadelphia, and he played as crucial a role as his predecessor, Thomas Jefferson, in his position as U.S. ambassador to France during the Terror, when French and American citizens alike sought his intervention, hoping to avoid losing their heads by guillotine. The author provides plausible explanations for this strange obscurity. Melanie Randolph Miller does much to humanize Morris's daily life, times and dilemmas, not to mention the big and small events of the French revolutionary era, deftly weaving into her text original and previously unknown sources, such as his own meticulously kept diaries, letters to and from his mistress, Adele Filleul, comtesse of Flahaut and other paramours, and urgent communications with key protagonists: the falling and fallen royal couple, Danton, Robespierre and the Girondins, among many others. The author's prose is brilliantly precise, enhanced by a dry and intelligent wit, and I agree with reviewers that the book is written with "the discipline of a historian but a novelist's eye," "a page turner." I admit that I found myself dragging my heels as I read along because, truth be told, I didn't really want to finish. In the final stretch, I stayed up way past my bedtime, skimming excitedly to learn what happened in the end, even though of course I already knew. I recommend Envoy to the Terror to anyone with more than a passing interest in the events of revolutionary Paris.
Book Description
A fierce, florid nationalist, Gouverneur Morris was the most colorful of Americas founding fathers. He financed and fought for American independence, witnessed firsthand the French revolution that followed, and brought his indomitable and outspoken presence to the table at the Constitutional Convention. There, he penned some of the most important and poetic sections of the Constitution, in the process creating the foundation of what Americans think of as democracy today. A decade in the making, this biography uses extensive eighteenth-century primary sources and recent scholarship to shed new light on Gouverneur Morris. In doing so, it places Morriss impressive achievements more fully in the context of his times and reveals how his independent spirit triumphed over accidents and reversals that would have crushed a lesser soul. It also examines Morriss writings and speeches in great detail and explores the major lines of influence that led Morris to give the Preamble of the Constitution of the United States the shape and content that govern and inspire us today.
Customer Reviews:
Founding Father.......2006-02-26
A solid biography of one of the best of the second tier of Founding Fathers. A most interesting life, with feet (given one was a peg leg) in the two most important revolutions of the late 1700s. Gouverneur Morris was at the deathbeds of John Paul Jones (in Paris) and Alexander Hamilton (in New York). George Washington admired his talents.
I enjoyed most Professor Kirschke's tracing of Morris' direct influence on the final drafting of sections of the U.S. Constitution.
While the author, in closing, compares his subject's career to that of Adlai Stevenson, I disagree. This comparison does not do full justice to Gouverneur Morris' many and varied contributions to our country's early history.
Book Description
Since 1996, Richard Brookhiser has devoted himself to recovering the Founding for modern Americans. The creators of our democracy had both the temptations and the shortcomings of all men, combined with the talents and idealism of the truly great. Among them, no Founding Father demonstrates the combination of temptations and talents quite so vividly as the least known of the greats, Gouverneur Morris.
His story is one that should be known by every American -- after all, he drafted the Constitution, and his hand lies behind many of its most important phrases. Yet he has been lost in the shadows of the Founders who became presidents and faces on our currency. As Brookhiser shows in this sparkling narrative, Morris's story is not only crucial to the Founding, it is also one of the most entertaining and instructive of all. Gouverneur Morris, more than Washington, Jefferson, or even Franklin, is the Founding Father whose story can most readily touch our hearts, and whose character is most sorely needed today.
He was a witty, peg-legged ladies' man. He was an eyewitness to two revolutions (American and French) who joked with George Washington, shared a mistress with Talleyrand, and lost friends to the guillotine. In his spare time he gave New York City its street grid and New York State the Erie Canal. His keen mind and his light, sure touch helped make our Constitution the most enduring fundamental set of laws in the world. In his private life, he suited himself; pleased the ladies until, at age fifty-seven, he settled down with one lady (and pleased her); and lived the life of a gentleman, for whom grace and humanity were as important as birth. He kept his good humor through war, mobs, arson, death, and two accidents that burned the flesh from one of his arms and cut off one of his legs below the knee.
Above all, he had the gift of a sunny disposition that allowed him to keep his head in any troubles. We have much to learn from him, and much pleasure to take in his company.
Customer Reviews:
The man who coined 'We the people,' thereby "defining every American as part of a single whole.".......2007-07-04
"Upon what principle is it that the slaves shall be computed in the representation? Are they men? Then make them citizens and let them vote. Are they property? Why then is no other property included?" "The admission of slaves into the representation when fairly explained comes to this: that the inhabitant of Georgia and South Carolina who goes to the coast of Africa and, in defiance of the most sacred laws of humanity, tears away his fellow creatures from their dearest connections and damns them to the most cruel bondages, shall have more votes in a government instituted for the protection of the rights of mankind than the citizen of Pennsylvania or New Jersey who views with a laudable horror so nefarious a practice." This voice during the American Constitutional Convention belonged to Gouverneur (his mother's maiden name) Morris. "Morris spoke 173 times at the Convention, more often than any other member, despite the fact that he missed all of June (while Madison, who attended every session spoke 161 times).
So it wasn't very surprising when, on 8 September 1786, the convention selected a five man committee which in turn gave Morris, of of its members, the task of putting together a draft based on all the previous proceedings that summer. Four days later Morris produced a clear, simple document avoiding legislative repetitions as far as possible; in one instance drafting down 23 articles from the Committee of Detail into a much more concise 7. And he also wrote this which ought sound familiar: "We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." Thank Morris for the coinage of "We the People." Convention drafts previously referred to "We the People of the states." A most important distinction. Brookhiser: "When Gouverneur Morris changed 'We the people of the states' into 'We the people,' he created a phrase that would ring throughout American history, defining every American as part of a single whole. Those three words may be his greatest legacy."
"As Jefferson immortalized the Continental Congress's view of first principles, so Morris had applied his finish to the Constitutional Convention's view of fundamental law. And he defended it later. Consider when Republicans "proposed a bill to disband the new federal courts" in 1801, notwithstanding that the Constitution provided for federal judges and expressly stated that such judges were not to be removed during good behavior. Argued an incredulous and sarcastic Morris at the time: "[Y]ou shall not take the man from the office, but you may take the office from the man; you shall not throw him overboard, but you may sink his boat under him; you shall not put him to death, but you may take away his life."
The man who witnessed the French Revolution up close and personal (being a minister to France between 1792 & 1794, and resident in Europe until December 1798---see Melanie Randolph Miller's Envoy to the Terror: Gouverneur Morris and the French Revolution) knew a thing or two about the importance of power remaining balanced, or at least subject to some checks. Though Morris did have some sympathy for the predicament the Jeffersonians, in Morris's view, faced: "Time...seems about to disclose the awful secret that commerce and domestic slavery are mortal foes; and, bound together, one must destroy the other. I cannot blame Southern gentlemen for striving to put down commerce, because commerce, if it survives, will, I think, put them down...."
"Morris did not leave his country on paper," however. Besides his work on the American Constitution and his historically important published diary impressions from those tumultuous years he spent in France, "Morris performed two special services as a public man." In addition to the above Morris also "worked to plan a canal that should make it bloom. A handful of other men might have buffed the Constitution almost as smoothly, but he was the one who did it; a handful of New Yorkers pushed for the Erie Canal---he was one of the most eloquent and energetic. For the rest, he gave many hours of intelligent and industrious labor as a New Yorker, a financier, and a diplomat;" as well as having been a member of the Continental Congress, and one who was instrumental in reviving the Continental Army's supplies after visiting GW at Valley Forge and recognizing the urgent need for such. (The details of many such efforts, I ought point out, are not especially delved into by Mr. Brookhiser in this somewhat short book---inclining this reader to regret not having at least considered some of the more substantive examinations of Gouverneur Morris' life before choosing this one).
With an injured arm and one leg, Morris evinced those who believed (as he did, in these words) "that the happiest mortals are those who have been taught, through some sad experience, the value of this world's goods." Like Hamilton, who came from nothing Morris was one who refused, in Mr. Brookhiser's words, "to be satisfied with airy ideals or soothing phrases" thanks, in part, "on the hard things each had seen in his life." (Interestingly, Morris delivered the eulogy at Hamilton's actual funeral in NY; and before that, gave the eulogy, also in NY, upon Washington's death.)
Postscript: Should you find yourself in Morrisania, or on Morris Avenue, or anywhere in the Morris Park section of the Bronx Borough of New York, perhaps even stopping at the Morris Park Bakery, pause a moment to reflect on the more important legacies of this founding father. In addition, a few blocks north and east of 138th Street and Brook Avenue (roughly the middle of where in the Bronx that Morris's estate Morrisania once could be found) stands St. Ann's Church where this founding father now rests. (07Jun) Cheers
Fun... but too short.......2005-11-28
After reading "Gentleman revolutionary", I found I wanted more on the life of Gouverneur Morris. Brookeiser's book just seemed to go by so darn quickly. But, I did, indeed, enjoy it.
I find that we Americans have spent so much time venerating our top five Founders (Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, Franklin and Madison/Adams tied for fifth) that we forget that it took hundreds of "founders" in that same era to midwife the country.
What about Pinckney, John Jay, Winthrop, Richard Heny Lee, and, yes, Gouverneur Morris? There are so many more that it would be impossible to mention them all in this short review.
At least, Brookhiser gave us a taste of a seldom-discussed Founder with this short bio. Even though Brookhieser obviously loves his subject, which in some reviewers leads to problematic reporting, it is chock full of interesting if not salacious tidbits. ( He married a woman accused of murder, was quite the ladies man, and even some sources claim Morris to be a deist though he was officially an Episcopalian)
Anyway, I hope to see Brookhiser do more on the Founders who are not household names.
Marginal........2005-06-17
This is the most misleading of books. The title would have you believe Gouverneur Morris wrote the Constitution. A few more founding Fathers naturally participated. However, Morris was Chairman of the Committee on Style which means Morris was primarily responsible for making printed sense out of the legal mumbo jumbo. He did this and did it well to include the Preamble, no mean feat. But he certainly did not write the Constitution as Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence. Nor did Morris himself ever claim to. If Morris did write the Constitution, as Richard Brookheiser claims in the title, why did Brookheiser spend less that 10% of the book reporting on what this work is purportedly all about, the Constitution and Morris' participation therein?
Aside from being misleading, this book just also happens to be very poorly written. It is cluttered and confusing. It is a shame the author does not give the reader a better opportunity to know Morris. Morris lived and participated in some of the Nation's most formative times. If the author had given his subject more attention, if he had said more about who Morris was and how he interacted with the events of his time, then this could have been a slam bang winner, a blockbuster of a fine work. Instead, the best thing that can be said is that it is a very cursory survey of the times in which Morris lived.
Mercifully, it is short.
A minor character in his own biography.......2005-05-05
I was really looking forward to reading this book. I am a nut for anything to do with the American Revolution. I'd read Brookhiser's short, concise bio on George Washington and enjoyed it very much.
I was so disappointed with this book. Just looking at the cover and reading the blurbs made me expect too much I guess.
Morris was known for 3 things: losing his leg, writing the Constitution, and scoring with the ladies. How could his life be turned into a snoozefest?
Maybe it's the writing...I just finished reading Ron Chernow's Alexander Hamilton bigoraphy, which is 3 times longer than this Morris bio. It was absolutely riveting. I was sorry when I finished it; I just did not want it to end. I could not finish the Morris book fast enough; I ended up skipping pages here and there to get to Morris; he seems to be missing in his own biography. Brookhiser gave me no sense as to the kind of man Gouverneur Morris really was.
Very disappointing!
Potentially a fascinating topic, poorly conceived.......2005-01-16
My biggest problem with the book is that I felt it was poorly written and conceived. Morris definitely is an interesting character, and I give credit to Brookheiser for reviving his legacy, but the book has a tendency to simply relate the facts without going into background material or much analysis or synthesis.
I felt the book was rushed and not adequately researched. Many areas need to be fleshed out better. Morris definitely belonged to the Founding Fathers clique and had an interesting personal life. If Brookheiser had simply delved into several periods or aspects of Morris' life, as Ellis did with American Sphinx, the book would have been better reading.
Having said that, the only people who are likely to read this book are those who have already done some reading on the birth of the USA and are motivated and able to deal the way the book was written to learn about this interesting character who pops up in biographies on Hamilton, Washington, and Jefferson, etc.
Book Description
A plainspoken, racy patrician who distrusted democracy but opposed slavery and championed freedom for all minorities, an important player in the American Revolution, later an astute critic of the French Revolution, Gouverneur Morris remains an enigma among the founding generation. This comprehensive, engrossing biography tells his robust story, including his celebrated love affairs during his long stay in Europe. Morris's public record is astonishing. One of the leading figures of the Constitutional Convention, he put the Constitution in its final version, including its opening Preamble. As Washington's first minister to Paris, he became America's most effective representative in France. A successful, international entrepreneur, he understood the dynamics of commerce in the modern world. Frankly cosmopolitan, he embraced city life as a creative center of civilization and had a central role in the building of the Erie Canal and in laying out the urban grid plan of Manhattan. William Howard Adams describes Morris's many contributions, talents, sophistication, and wit, as well as his romantic liaisons, free habits, and free speech. He brings to life a fascinating man of great stature, a founding father who receives his due at last.
Customer Reviews:
A missed opportunity.......2005-06-21
For years, my knowledge of the revolutionary and federalist eras were informed by bland college textbooks, indifferent professors, and mythological stories. Imagine my joy when contemporary writers (McCullough, Ellis, Zinn, Shaara, etc.) managed to highlight the remarkable achievements of the individuals involved in these eras.
In many of the publications, I kept seeing Morris' name pop up and thought I would read this biography. The main problem with this book is the writing and style. While technically obeying the elements of the English language, the author's style is agonizingly plodding and uninteresting (just like the textbooks and professors that encouraged me to avoid historical scholarship for the first 25 years of my life). Frustratingly, the author applauds the efforts of Ellis, McCullough, and Elkins in brining the people and events of this era alive -- and then does the exact opposite, writing a book so bland discombobulated only a machoist could enjoy it.
There is a reason public demand is so high for books by Chernow, Ellis, and Brands and why this book will quickly be relegated to never-been-checked-out library book sales. The author had an opportunity to write about an interesting subject, but choose instead to write a pretentious 300 page sleeping pill. What a missed opportunity!
By itself, the book is tolerable, but put it next to Chernow, Ellis, or even Elkins and McKitrick and it is crushed. On the bright side, you could learn a thing or two about Morris by reading this book -- just don't expect to have near as much fun as you would with other authors.
Adams Spendidly Gives Morris his Just Due.......2004-02-18
In his book, "Gouverneur Morris: An Independent Life," William Howard Adams splendidly brings to life one of our Republic's most important citizens, the incomparable, the iconic, Gouverneur Morris! It's fair to say that this remarkable, witty, intellectual and cynical man was "The Bronx." His family estate, Morrisania, encompassed 9,000 acres of that area in New York. It stretched from the Harlem River to the south and touched on the East River, facing Randall's Island.
Morris was a New Yorker, all 6 ft. 4 inches of him. When Manhattan was young, he was young, too, graduating from King's College, (now Columbia), just before the outbreak of the American Revolution. As a budding lawyer, he tied his rising political star to the powerful Livington faction in NY State. Morris knew everybody that was anybody in NY, PA, MD, and Virginia. He later did a stint, as a Federalist, in the U.S. Senate, too.
Morris didn't hesitate to keep a record of his personal views on the leading American personalities of his day, ranging from: Alexander Hamilton; John Jay; the Immortal George Washington; James Monroe; the legal giant, John Marshall; John Adams; James Madison; Aaron Burr, Thomas Jefferson; Ben Franklin; and his intimate friend, the legendary financier, Robert Morris, to name just a few. When General Washington was desperate for aid for his troops camped at Valley Forge, PA, it was Morris, who provided it. Working with (not a relative) Robert Morris, Gouverneur was able to devise a financial plan that kept the Continental Army afloat until the French government could come to its rescue, just prior to the Allies' great victory at Yorktown, VA, over the British imperialists.
As a delegate to the Philadelphia Convention in 1787, Morris helped to draft the Constitution and authored its "Preamble," one of the most powerful statements in all of the literature of that heroic period. He opposed slavery even though he owned slaves. He championed a Republican government, with checks and balances, to keep any tyrant from taking power and/or the Mob.
As an American Envoy, Morris also witnessed the "Reign of Terror," in France first hand. He had a lot to say, most of it very insightful, about why that experiment failed so miserably. Morris was critical, too, of the Marquis Lafayette's role in that bloodstained fiasco. He believed that Lafayette, a bona fide hero of the American Republic, was too much of "an idealist" to control or influence in a positive way that highly manipulated process. When Lafayette ended up in a grim Austrian prison, it was Morris, nevertheless, that worked behind the scenes to secure his eventual release.
Adams weaved into his portrait of Morris, the passionate love of his life, Adelaide Marie Emile (who was also the lady friend of that foxy Talleyrand). While Paris is descending into chaos, the one-legged Morris (he has lost his left leg in an accident), was chasing after "Adel." He finally caught her. But alas, their romance was not to last. Morris, depressed, consoled himself for a while with traveling throughout Europe. An astute business man, he made a fortune speculating in land, especially in Northern New York. At age 59, the old patriot, who had championed the building of the Erie Canal and laid out, in the role of an urban planner, New York City, settled down on his beloved estate at Morrisania, married a Virginia belle and fathered one child. He died, at age 64, in 1816.
This first rate biography belongs in the library of every lover of the history of the American Revolution. Adams has given Gouverneur Morris, an ardent and brave advocate of republican liberty, his just due.
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Address delivered before the Society of California Volunteers at its first annual celebration at San Francisco April 25th 1866 Gale Archival Editions: On Demand are digital copies of rare and out-of-print historical content. Delivered where and when you need them, Gale Archival Editions arrive complete with original fonts, marks, notations, punctuation and spelling, giving you the feeling of owning the original work. These images of original works—from the world's leading libraries—include everything from books to pamphlets, many with original illustrations, indexes, maps and other annotations. Sourced from Joseph Sabin's Bibliotheca Americana: A Dictionary of Books Relating to America from its Discovery to the Present Time (1868-1936), the Sabin American Civil War Collection includes thousands of titles on all topics related to the Civil War experience.
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This volume is produced from digital images from the Cornell University Library Samuel J. May Anti-Slavery Collection
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Aladdin O'Brien
Gouverneur Morris
Manufacturer: IndyPublish.com
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
 Contemporary
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ASIN: 1404356355 |
Book Description
"Look out for the lantern," she called, and threw the hay down to him. She brought, in all, seven large bundles and was starting for the eighth, when, by a special act of Providence, the flooring gave again, and she made an excellent imitation of Aladdin's shute on the previous evening. By good fortune, however, she landed on the soft hay and was not hurt beyond a few scratches.
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"It was many and many a year ago, In a kingdom by the sea, That a maiden there lived whom you may know By the name of Annabel Lee. And this maiden she lived with no other thought Than to love and be loved by me. I was a child and she was a child" -
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