The Shoemaker and the Tea Party: Memory and the American Revolution

The Shoemaker and the Tea Party comprises two linked essays. The first is about Hewes (whom Young describes as "a nobody who briefly became a somebody in the Revolution and, for a moment near the end of his life, a hero"), his memories, and what these memories reveal about the meaning of the Revolution for him. "For a moment he was on a level with his betters. So he thought at the time, and so it grew in his memory as it disappeared in his life." The second essay follows the lead of Michael Kammen and Eric Hobsbawm by looking at the dichotomies of public vs. private and popular vs. official memory, and the external forces that shape these memories into "tradition." Young does an excellent job of illustrating his theory with experiences from Hewes's life, newspaper accounts, and contemporary prints. This book will interest both scholars and general readers, though Young does presume some prior knowledge of the Revolution on the part of the reader. A thought-provoking look at the nature of memory, history, and tradition. --Sunny Delaney

Product Description
George Robert Twelves Hewes, a Boston shoemaker who participated in such key events of the American Revolution as the Boston Massacre and teh Tea Party, might have been lost to history if not for his longevity and the historical mood of the 1830's. When the Tea Party became a leading symbol of the Revolutionary ear fifty years after the actual event, this "common man" in his nineties was "discovered" and celebrated in Boston as a national hero. Young pieces together this extraordinary tale, adding new insights about the role that individual and collective memory play in shaping our understanding of history.

Young relates the events of Hewes life through contemporary biographers who had on hand the last of the revolutionary warriors. Contemporaries, intent on justifying and embellishing the memory of the revolutionary fathers, left a clear track of what the people of 19th century America wanted to know and to believe about their forebearers. It matters little that it would have been extremely unlikely that Hewes was present at every event he recalled.

That is Young's point. Sometimes, the story tells us as much about the historian and the market for his writing as it does about the event being recorded. Historical interpretation is recollection of events and placing them in context. Even immediately after an event, the eyewitness accounts vary. Today's historian may fall prey to superimposing current attitudes and values on prior events as those these are determinants.

Young's Shoemaker is a valuable caution to interpreters of history.


Just another Shoemaker   April 26, 2001
 10 out of 10 found this review helpful

Alfred Young's book is a well-written example of how ordinary people shaped the Revolution. History tends to limit itself to the "Great Men" of the time, but sometimes an ordinary person like George Robert Twelves Hewes finds himself recorded into history. In this case, Hewes just happened to outlive many of the others who fought in the Revolution, and his experiences managed to live on in two biographies written about him while he was still alive. But Hewes is only part of the story. The rest of the book details how certain events of the Revolution have been forgotten (or at least not celebrated) such as the tar-and-feathering of John Malcolm. Young's book is striking and poignant, and it is written in a curt manner. I would suggest this book to anybody who has an interest in the American Revolution.


"I doff my hat to no man on the streets of Boston"   December 24, 2000
 8 out of 8 found this review helpful

How did the idea of a revolution take hold among those who cared little about a tax on tea? The story of an apprentice shoemaker, (the lowest of the trades, we learn) who, one year humbles himself at the house of a successful Bostonian businessman, and, the next year refuses to doff his hat to a British ship's captain on the street. What changed him? Divided into two parts, the first half of this book is excellent, the second half less so. More academic than a pop history, but still a good read, I'm glad I bought it. The kind of book that leaves you feeling you learned something and read a good book at the same time.


Good book, but edit it please   July 23, 2000
 8 out of 15 found this review helpful

This book is worthwhile. Although it is an interesting examination of a regular person's involvment in large historical events, it is repetitive and needs to be edited. The book seems to have been written to drum into a reader's head the writer's opinions, rather than share his great discoveries. He uses the word "conservative" so many times that it becomes meaningless. Hopefully, the writer can free himself of these habits to write an even better book.


This book is a gem   May 15, 2000
 7 out of 7 found this review helpful

As I get older, I get less & less likely to read those American History "survey" books than ever, and to find my solace in "little books" about real events that the historians use as a lever to explain, to explain intensely, a slice of the past. The Shoemaker & the Tea Party is just such a volume of interpretive history. The book consists of two historical essays, the first of which dredges everything we could possibly find out about the Shoemaker & his involvement in historical events ... the second which evaluates how the Tea Party has been viewed through history as different "powers" have had their hands on the rudder of historical interpretation. This book, like others about the early Republic, shows how our revolution was a profoundly conservative event, not an event that challenged the social structure of the colonies (except insofar as assets from the Tory elite were confiscated by the revolutionary elite). Although the revolution was made by both the elite & the workingman (tradesman & farmers), it was naturally the elite who chose to view & to institutionalize that view, historical events through their own eyes. The importance of social stability was paramount, hence the mob'ist origins of the revolution were downplayed or ignored. By the time this fellow, the Shoemaker, reemerged in the 1830s, the course of our American History writing about this topic was set in stone. The revolution was not a chaotic, angry event, but a smooth, patriotic one. This is a short book, alittle pricey for its length, but well worth reading.