I feel profoundly fortunate that the decade I spent on this book allowed me to meet so many wonderful people while keeping me grounded in my loving homes.
This project grew out of my first encounter with British soldiers’ wives in the Special Collections of Carleton College. Had Kristi Wermager not told me about Carleton’s pamphlets from the American Revolution, I might never have learned about Isabella Montgomery and Susannah Cathcart talking trash on their stoops on the night of March 5, 1770. Since that initial discovery, Carleton has generously supported this project in ways large and small. The Dean’s Office funded an exploratory trip to Boston; on my first day in the archives, I found a soldier’s marriage record and felt sure that I was onto a new story of the Boston Massacre. The Faculty Grants Committee helped me travel to England, Ireland, and Nova Scotia. I am intensely grateful to the talented archivists and library staff at the National Archives in London, the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland in Dublin, and the Public Archives of Nova Scotia in Halifax. Terese Austin and others at the Clements Library in Ann Arbor went far beyond the call of duty to assist me.
As the evidence of military families in Boston piled up, I knew I needed support in sorting out all the connections I was finding. Nikki Lamberty, administrative assistant extraordinaire of Carleton’s History Department, found me the amazing undergraduate research assistants without whose meticulous work this project would have been impossible. Special thanks to Becky Canary-King, Lauren Nakamura, and, in particular, Lief Esbenshade: they transcribed thousands of names from muster rolls and church records and painstakingly checked the database of military-civilian connections at the heart of this book.
Historians, teachers, students, and history buffs across the country offered me warm support and helpful feedback in many venues. My thanks to all, though I can list only a few by name. John Sensbach, Margaret Newell, Rick Bell, Dan Richter, Mark Peterson, and Barbara Oberg created welcome opportunities for me to share my findings. Katherine Gerbner, Kirsten Fischer, and Joanne Janke-Wegner make the University of Minnesota Atlantic Workshop the perfect place to try out ideas. Special thanks to Carolyn Eastman, Janet Polasky, and Rosie Zagarri—magnificent friends and gracious hosts.
I am enormously grateful that Nina Dayton, Nat Sheidley, and Kate Haulman read the entire manuscript. They did their best to save me from errors. I am awed by the liberality of scholars who offered me sources from their own research, including Mary Beth Norton, David Niescior, and Don Hagist. Eric Hinderaker’s professional and intellectual generosity will forever be an example.
My Carleton colleagues endured many conversations about war, writing, and family. Andrew Fischer, Adeeb Khalid, Amna Khalid, and Jessica Leiman were patient interlocutors. I thank the Carleton College Humanities Center, especially its former director, Susannah Ottaway, who supported Michael McNally and me as we explored the meaning and practice of accessible scholarship through our seminar, “Varieties of Public Humanities.” I learned from all my fellow participants, especially Nancy Cho, who first encouraged me to imagine what lay beyond the edges of Paul Revere’s engraving. Wei-Hsin Fu patiently taught me and my students ArcGIS in order to create a meticulous map of Boston. Credit for the beautiful map of Boston is due to her.
I wish to express gratitude to the National Endowment for the Humanities and the American Council of Learned Societies, whose fellowships supported the first draft of this book. I enjoyed a wonderful month at the Huntington Library as well as Betty Medearis’s writing retreat. I thank Dean Beverly Nagel for the nearly two years away from teaching during these fellowships.
My heartfelt thanks to the Massachusetts Historical Society. Peter Drummey, Elaine Heavey, Anna Clutterbuck-Cook, and their colleagues create a spectacular home for scholars. I especially acknowledge Conrad Wright, who nurtured this project by making it possible for me to spend many summers at the MHS.
With a little help from Ari Kelman, I found my agent, Lisa Adams of the Garamond Agency. Her sharp editorial eye and calm guidance improved my manuscript in many ways. She connected me to Deanne Urmy and her superlative team at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt: editorial assistants Jenny Xu and Mary Cait Milliff, production editor Heather Tamarkin, and the copyeditor of every writer’s dreams, Susanna Brougham. After nearly twenty years of Minnesota Nice, Deanne’s directness startled and comforted me. Working with Deanne has been one of the most fulfilling and rigorous intellectual experiences of my life. No one had ever really taught me how to tell a story before. Thank you.
Three other women made it possible for me to write this book. First, Kate Haulman, my kindred spirit in early America; Lori Pearson, without whom I cannot imagine life at Carleton; and Jan Lewis, who died before she could read this book in its entirety, but who made me the historian that I am.
It is fitting that a book about family has so shaped my own. My children, Julian, Leo, and Sebastian, have spent every summer for over ten years in New England while I dug through archives. I cannot thank my parents enough for opening their home to us for months at a time, shuttling my children to camp, and making them lunches. I will always treasure the summers I spent commuting from Alewife with my father. The opportunity to luxuriate in my mother’s energy and love was an unexpected gift.
My brilliant husband, Christopher Brunelle, sustained this project in every way imaginable, from living with his in-laws to spending countless hours on language and line-editing. Hardly a word would have been written without the coffee that he lovingly brings me each day. That morning cup is only the smallest (if tastiest) manifestation of his unfailing support.