This post is part apology, part celebration. After five years of research, books, libraries and writing, writing, writing, I have at last finished my manuscript about the Declaration of Independence! Five years! In addition to moving, reparing an historic house, running a business and publishing Bonjour 40, I filled in my spare time doing this. I have been weepy all week and thrilled beyond measure. So, yaaaaay!
This post is in part an apology, because in the last month in order to finish the last hundred or so pages, I have ignored many of you. I’ve been delinquent with communication, forgotten to do a few things, and been late to more than one event. For all of you who wondered what happened, I was just spending time 237 years ago, and they didn’t have internet then.
I have been writing the book chronologically, and from page one to the end. So in this last month, these fictitious people have finally been performing my scenes I outlined for them years ago. It’s been joyous. Emotional. Thrilling. As a friend said, “It’s epic. What you’re writing is epic.” I hope so. My characters have at last become who I knew they could be.
Yes, there will be more edits (I’ve already done numerous edits). Yes, there will be plenty of work ahead to find an agent, a publisher, and readers. However, for those who are already asking what’s next… Please just let me swim in THE END until my fingers get all pruny. For just a little while.
One of the books I have referenced while writing my novel about the Declaration is American Scripture: Making the Declaration of Independence by Pauline Maier. Fairly early into my research I found her book, and when I still had a question or two I e-mailed her. Within a day, she responded.
Her enthusiasm will be missed. In her book, she writes of being able to see the Declaration in Washington for the first time. “Curiosity more than anything sent me rushing through the hot summer air across the mall to the National Archives.”
By Karen A. ChaseThe Dunlap Broadside first printed on July 4th. From the held at the Yale University Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.
As you fire up the BBQ and ready your fireworks, you should realize you are technically not celebrating “independence,” but celebrating the Declaration of Independence. Here’s why.
The day the founding fathers voted to approve the resolution for independence was actually July 2nd, 1776. On that day, Americans agreed to kiss the Crown goodbye. (They didn’t agree unanimously–note how that word is missing on the above image–until July 15th though, because it took New York a while to agree to the resolution.) After July 2nd, came the drafting of a formal declaration which Congress debated and edited for a couple of days. By the time they had approved the document, it was July 4th. That’s the date that appeared on the first printed copies of the Declaration, also known as “broadsides.” (A sheet of paper printed on one side.) There were about 200 or so of those printed by John Dunlap of Philadelphia.
All along we’ve celebrated independence on July 4th, because that’s the date the public first saw printed on the broadsides. There were no signatures on these copies, because they were typeset. The big Declaration of Independence, the parchment most of us recognize with the signatures at the bottom, didn’t come until later.
As for those original 200 broadsides, there were 24 known copies up until 1989. Then a painting was bought for $4 at a flea market for the frame. Behind the canvas was a 25th copy. It sold for $2.4 million. A 26th copy was “found” in the National Archives is Kew, England in 1990.
Those who have followed my Facebook posts lately, know I’ve been up to my shins (sans rickets) researching sailing during the American Revolution. I have planned a sea-faring battle scene for my new book about the Declaration of Independence, and I frankly know less about sailing than stowaway rats.
So, I hit Wikipedia and I freaked out at complicated diagrams of boat parts. I read books and ordered one by Alexander Kent (which Ted stole it for himself). A friend even suggested looking at video games like “East India” where you engage in battles.
I also unearthed a New York Times story from 2011, which described the unusual surprise of finding an 18th century sailing vessel below Ground Zero in Manhattan as they dug it out to begin construction. The article provided much needed details from the real deal. I gleaned the ship’s size, what it carried, and David W. Dunlap who wrote the article was kind enough to use ship terminology simplified for the average Times reader.
Research also helped me name one of my fictional ships. My British ship will be loosely based on the Swedish replica of the Götheborg, and this existing replica allowed me to find details that are more realistic. However, my ship needed to be British, and I had trouble finding a direct translation of “Götheborg.” Finally, I did a little Google map search and settled on calling it HMS Montagu. The Swedish embassy in London is on Montagu Street.
Wikimedia Commons, which contains Public Domain images, was also a great resource. I found this painting by Francis Swaine called “An English Sloop Becalmed near the Shore,” featuring an 18th century sloop. I made the painting the desktop image on my laptop to help inspire my writing.
Please forgive my slightly longer word-count on my last blog before the New Year… I must share a thought or two…
Many of my readers, friends and family know I’ve been working on a new novel about the Declaration of Independence. Through my research, I’ve come to learn about two of the lesser-known, yet great founding fathers: George Wythe of Virginia, and Oliver Wolcott of Connecticut. Both of them voted for revolution and signed the document. Before the signing, and throughout the war, they played very different roles, pouring their talents, connections, hearts and minds into very different vessels for “the Cause.”
Oliver Wolcott, in an ironic story, watched as rebel soldiers in New York pulled down a massive iron statue of King George III. He had it carted back to Connecticut, and with the help of family and neighbors, they melted down the king and poured him into molds to make over 40,000 musket balls. All of those cartridges went on to be fired by the Continental Army upon the British during the war.
In Virginia, George Wythe, a professor at William & Mary, taught the man who wrote the Declaration. Thomas Jefferson studied under Wythe in Williamsburg, as did James Monroe, Henry Clay, and our longest-serving Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, John Marshall. Everything that Wythe had learned of Greek history, of Euripides, of Francis Bacon and of John Locke’s beliefs about life and liberty was poured into his students. After signing the Declaration himself, Wythe fought for the abolishment of slavery, designed the Virginia state seal, and more. But it was through Jefferson as his pen, that Wythe gave America the Declaration in 1776.
As many know, that one piece of parchment not only helped free America from oppression, our Declaration became the gold standard from which dozens of declarations for freedom have sprung. France used sections for their Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizens (1784), as did Haiti (1804), Chili (1818), New Zealand (1835), Texas (1836), Czechoslovakia (1918), and even Vietnam (1945), among others.
Very few people besides historians (and my DAR ladies) seem to know much about George Wythe, and even fewer have heard of Oliver Wolcott, with only a small handful ever having heard the King George statue story. The world knows about Thomas Jefferson, and his statue keeps watch over our nation’s capitol. Each year, over two million people visit the National Archives in D.C. to see the original Declaration of Independence. Seldom has anyone given thought to the musket balls, except long-dead relatives who mourned the lives of those British soldiers who never returned home. So, what can we learn from our own history?
We have choice in life. Into which vessel will we pour ourselves? Will it be into a musket ball or an education? History has shown us that while weapons can help a country win a battle, an education will absolutely free the world. This truth, is self-evident.
My heart mourns for the students and teachers of Sandy Hook Elementary and their families. Sadly, those little ones were not yet of the age to have learned about the Declaration. However, the education being shared in that classroom and others before the tragedy took place… that is the firepower that will make America proud, strong and free. That is the weapon in which we should invest the most if we are to secure our future.
I hope you’ll forward this on until we all learn that rights are best freed with our minds. Not might.
I wish you a peaceful, thoughtful, and loving holiday. See you in the New Year.
“The pen is mightier than the sword,” said Edward Bulwer-Lytton. The above painting by Jean Leon Gerome Ferris is of the drafting of the Declaration of Independence featuring Thomas Jefferson (right), Benjamin Franklin (left), and John Adams (center). The painting is currently located at the Virginia Historical Society here in Richmond.
This week I was asked where I’ve been conducting research for my novel about the American Revolution. My response was, “would you like that alphabetically or chronologically?” Certainly, I’ve worked with the traditional sources like libraries and archives. However, historical fiction isn’t like non-fiction where you must always go in search of proof. Sometimes it’s in search of opportunities for fiction.
Conflicting viewpoints are one way to find it. Wikipedia. Blogs. Historians. Those resources are filled with proofs and facts, but also opinions, theories and undocumented sources. Where two ideas collide gives me the opportunity to draw out what would happen if one of those two ideas was correct.
I also search for holes. Historical documents, textbooks (especially elementary and high school versions), and websites by historic hobbyists don’t always provide the same level of facts. Where I find a repeated dearth of details with regard to a place, event or time, is a hole I can fill with… well… stuff I make up.
I also research for the senses. I rarely find those in a book, so I travel to actual locations. I want to hear a place, smell it, touch trees, or look at the view – even if they’ve changed. There’s often a nearby museum, and there’s always some historic-ranger-docent guy who loves the place or whose grandpa told stories. I love them. After all, that’s what I do. Tell stories.
How do you conduct historical research for fiction?
By Karen A. ChaseDuring one of my research trips a couple years ago I visited the Philadelphia State House where the Founding Fathers signed the Declaration of Independence. (I was blonder then. I'm much smarter after all this research.)
For the last three years, whenever I could, I’ve been conducting research for an historical fiction novel I’m writing about the American Revolution. With the upcoming July fourth holiday we celebrate the Declaration of Independence, so I share some of what I learned about the drafting of the finished piece.
Thomas Jefferson, as most know, was the main writer. Most don’t know he wrote it in just two days. The Continental Congress agreed to the resolution for independence on July second, Jefferson presented his rough draft after a little editing help from Adams and Franklin (read Adams’ first-hand account here), the Congress cut off about another quarter of the text, and the formal finished piece was adopted on July fourth. That day, John Dunlap printed 200 copies to distribute throughout the colonies, twenty-four of which exist today, including one in nearby Jamestown Yorktown Victory Center.
The famous parchment version with all the signatures, now housed at the National Archives, had some editing issues. The word “unalienable” was misspelled. It should be “inalienable.” When the founding fathers went to sign it, it’s assumed Jefferson’s hand corrected a couple more. The word “representatives” was missing the “en” so that was penned in. The word “only” was also inserted about ten lines up from the bottom into “Our repeated Petitions have been answered only in repeated injury.” You can actually see the changes on the original parchment. They make me feel so much better about my own editing mistakes.
