Kenneth Roberts – The Unofficial Site

A blog by ‘Peter Porcupine’ (see the about page) provides a post (posted yearly on the 4th of July) on the defining moment of our country.  In this post, he gives a kind word to Roberts’ Oliver Wiswell:

If you signed this [the Declaration of Independence], you were a marked man. Make no mistake, if the American Revolution had not been a success, and you had signed this document, you would be hung as a traitor. The references to honor and life are not hyperbole, but a statement of fact. The success of the Revolution was far from a foregone conclusion, or a ‘self-evident truth’. To understand the pressures of neighbor against neighbor and to enjoy a great lost classic, consider reading the novel, ‘Oliver Wiswell’ by Kenneth Roberts, the story of an honorable man from the Blue Hills outside of Boston, caught up in revolutionary times, but unable to overcome his scruples regarding loyalty to the Crown, a reluctant and troubled Loyalist. I knew so many like him, who had lost their families and fortunes, swept away in a tide which engulfed a continent.

Filed under: Uncategorized |