Michel-Guillaume-Saint-Jean de Crèvecoeur

French-American author
Also known as: Hector Saint John de Crèvecoeur, J. Hector St. John
Quick Facts
Also called:
Hector Saint John de Crèvecoeur or (especially in America) J. Hector St. John
Born:
January 31, 1735, Caen, France
Died:
November 12, 1813, Sarcelles (aged 78)

Michel-Guillaume-Saint-Jean de Crèvecoeur (born January 31, 1735, Caen, France—died November 12, 1813, Sarcelles) was a French American author whose work provided a broad picture of life in the New World.

After study in Jesuit schools and four years as an officer and mapmaker in Canada, Crèvecoeur chose in 1759 to remain in the New World. He wandered the Ohio and Great Lakes region, took out citizenship papers in New York in 1765, became a farmer in Orange county, and in 1769 married Mehitable Tippet, with whom he had three children.

When the American Revolution broke out, Crèvecoeur found himself in an untenable position: his wife was from a loyalist family and he had friends and neighbours among the opposite faction. Persecuted by both sides, he left rebel country only to languish for months in a British army prison in New York City before sailing for Europe in 1780, accompanied by one son. In London, using his American name, J. Hector St. John, he arranged for the publication in 1782 of 12 essays called Letters from an American Farmer.

Within two years this book—charmingly written, optimistic, and timely—saw eight editions in five countries and made its author famous, gaining him such influential patrons as the naturalist the comte de Buffon and Benjamin Franklin, a membership in France’s Academy of Sciences, and an appointment as French consul to three of the new states in America. Before assuming his consular duties in 1784, Crèvecoeur translated and added to the original 12 essays, in Lettres d’un cultivateur Américain, 2 vol. (Paris, 1784).

In America again, Crèvecoeur found his home burned, his wife dead, and his daughter and second son with strangers in Boston. Reunited with his children, he set about organizing a packet service between the United States and France, continued an interest in botany, and published articles on agriculture and medicine. A two-year furlough in Europe resulted in a larger, second edition of the French Lettres, 3 vol. (1790). Recalled from his consulship in 1790, Crèvecoeur wrote one other book on America, Voyage dans la haute Pennsylvanie et dans l’État de New York, 3 vol. (1801; Travels in Upper Pennsylvania and New York, 1961). He lived quietly in France and Germany until his death.

Because of his letters, Crèvecoeur was not only for a while the most widely read commentator on America but also a great favourite with such Romantics as Charles Lamb and Thomas Campbell and with the revolutionist Jacques-Pierre Brissot. His reputation was further increased in the 1920s when a bundle of his unpublished English essays was discovered in an attic in France. These were brought out as Sketches of Eighteenth Century America, or More Letters from an American Farmer (1925). Crèvecoeur’s books outline the steps through which new immigrants passed, analyze the religious problems of the New World, describe the life of the whalers of Nantucket, reveal much about the Indians and the horrors of the Revolution, and present the colonial farmer—his psychology and his daily existence—more completely than any contemporaneous writings were able to do. The passage containing his “melting pot” theory and answering the question “What is an American?” is widely quoted, and historians of the frontier depend heavily on his documented account of the stages by which the log cabin became the opulent farmhouse. His charming style, keen eye, and simple philosophy are universally admired.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Quick Facts
Also called:
United States War of Independence or American Revolutionary War
Date:
1775 - September 3, 1783
Location:
United States
Top Questions

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The American Revolution was an insurrection carried out by 13 of Great Britain’s North American colonies that began in 1775 and ended with a peace treaty in 1783. The colonies won political independence and went on to form the United States of America. The war followed more than a decade of growing estrangement between the British crown and a large and influential segment of its North American colonies that was caused by British attempts to assert greater control over colonial affairs after having long adhered to a policy of salutary neglect.

Until early in 1778 the conflict was a civil war within the British Empire, but afterward it became an international war as France (in 1778) and Spain (in 1779) joined the colonies against Britain. Meanwhile, the Netherlands, which provided both official recognition of the United States and financial support for it, was engaged in its own war against Britain (see Anglo-Dutch Wars). From the beginning, sea power was vital in determining the course of the war, lending to British strategy a flexibility that helped compensate for the comparatively small numbers of troops sent to America and ultimately enabling the French to help bring about the final British surrender at Yorktown in 1781.

Setting the stage: The two armies

The American colonies fought the war on land with essentially two types of organization: the Continental (national) Army and the state militias. The total number of the former provided by quotas from the states throughout the conflict was 231,771 soldiers, and the militias totaled 164,087. At any given time, however, the American forces seldom numbered over 20,000; in 1781 there were only about 29,000 insurgents under arms throughout the country. The war was therefore one fought by small field armies. Militias, poorly disciplined and with elected officers, were summoned for periods usually not exceeding three months. The terms of Continental Army service were only gradually increased from one to three years, and not even bounties and the offer of land kept the army up to strength. Reasons for the difficulty in maintaining an adequate Continental force included the colonists’ traditional antipathy toward regular armies, the objections of farmers to being away from their fields, the competition of the states with the Continental Congress to keep men in the militia, and the wretched and uncertain pay in a period of inflation.

By contrast, the British army was a reliable steady force of professionals. Since it numbered only about 42,000, heavy recruiting programs were introduced. Many of the enlisted men were farm boys, as were most of the Americans, while others came from cities where they had been unable to find work. Still others joined the army to escape fines or imprisonment. The great majority became efficient soldiers as a result of sound training and ferocious discipline. The officers were drawn largely from the gentry and the aristocracy and obtained their commissions and promotions by purchase. Though they received no formal training, they were not so dependent on a book knowledge of military tactics as were many of the Americans. British generals, however, tended toward a lack of imagination and initiative, while those who demonstrated such qualities often were rash.

American Colonial Flag, popularly attributed to Betsy Ross, was designed during the American Revolutionary War features 13 stars to represent the original 13 colonies.
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Facts You Should Know: American Revolution

Because troops were few and conscription unknown, the British government, following a traditional policy, purchased about 30,000 troops from various German princes. The Lensgreve (landgrave) of Hesse furnished approximately three-fifths of that total. Few acts by the crown roused so much antagonism in America as that use of foreign mercenaries.