Soldiers of Settlement: Violence and Psychological Warfare on the Kentucky Frontier, 1775-1783

Violence and Psychological Warfare on the Kentucky Frontier

First, some news which might interest those who enjoy American History, American Studies, and the Kentucky Frontier. In the next couple of weeks I intend to produce a series of podcast lectures which will be released via iTunes which you may enjoy listening to. The series will probably take the form of a three or four part lecture examining Daniel Boone’s narrative/collaborative autobiography “The Adventures of Daniel Boon.” I hope to make the lectures as accessible (and interesting!) as possible, providing an insight into my research area whilst showing how this great source can be read and understood. The idea, at least at this stage, is to provide a fun way of learning about the Kentucky frontier and the life of Daniel Boone by examining primary sources like Boone’s narrative. I will, of course, provide the relevant sections of the narrative in this blog along with any other materials which may be required to get the most from this series. I want to emphasise that I am not setting homework(!) and I intend the podcasts to be standalone, enjoyable listening experiences. That said, for those who want to get into these sources, and this subject, in more detail the materials will be provided here. At the moment I don’t have too much more to say – I plan to start writing and recording them this week – but once I’ve some more to share I’ll do so here and on my twitter account (@ThatHistorian).

I also wanted to share a paper that I wrote several years ago based on my Master’s thesis. The essay “Soldiers of Settlement: Violence and Psychological Warfare on the Kentucky Frontier, 1775-1783” was published in Eras, a journal published by Monash University back in 2008. I should qualify this by saying that this paper is a bit rough around the edges and as it came from a relatively early phase in my research is based on only a fraction of my later findings. All that being the case, if you are interested in the Kentucky frontier or the role played by psychological warfare you may find it of some interest (at the very least it provides some hints at how my work would later develop!). You can read the paper in PDF form by Clicking Here though I recommend saving the file first (to save on loading time). You can do that by RIGHT clicking THIS LINK and selecting “Save File” (or something similar, depending on your browser). As always, feedback and comments are welcome.

To See Through a Pioneer’s Eyes