This is the 4th book in a 6-book series that develops a hypothesis regarding the expansion of the P-R-S family over a period of 3,000 years. We are now into the historical period where individuals and their actions are well documented. At this point, I am following the branch of the P-R-S family that most likely are my recent ancestors. They led a very interesting lives starting with George Pearis and his wife Sarah arriving in Pennsylvania and settling in Winchester, Virginia with a daughter and three sons (George Jr., Richard and Robert). They became involved with trading with the Cherokee in the western Carolinas and Tennessee and crossed paths with a number of historically significant people including George Washington and Lord Fairfax. This book includes the French and Indian War and the run up to the War of Independence. The three brothers from Ireland, ended up in the western Carolinas with Richard (present day Greenville, SC) and Robert (Charleston, SC) supporting the British and George Jr. (old Tryon County, NC) and his sons (who were born near Winchester and moved into eastern Tennessee) firmly supporting the cause of independence. In books 5 and 6, the focus will be on descendent of Richard in western North Carolina until 1950.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Multinational, profit-driven, materialistic, politically self-conscious, power-hungry, religiously plural: America three hundred years ago -- and today. Here are Britain's mainland American colonies after 1680, in the process of becoming the first modern society -- a society the earliest colonists never imagined, a "new order of the ages" that anticipated the American Revolution. Jon Butler's panoramic view of the colonies in this epoch transforms our customary picture of prerevolutionary America; it reveals a strikingly "modern" character that belies the eighteenth-century quaintness fixed in history. Stressing the middle and late decades (the hitherto "dark ages") of the American colonial experience, and emphasizing the importance of the middle and southern colonies as well as New England, Becoming America shows us transformations before 1776 among an unusually diverse assortment of peoples. Here is a polyglot population of English, Indians, Africans, Scots, Germans, Swiss, Swedes, and French; a society of small colonial cities with enormous urban complexities; an economy of prosperous farmers thrust into international market economies; peoples of immense wealth, a burgeoning middle class, and incredible poverty. Butler depicts settlers pursuing sophisticated provincial politics that ultimately sparked revolution and a new nation; developing new patterns in production, consumption, crafts, and trades that remade commerce at home and abroad; and fashioning a society remarkably pluralistic in religion, whose tolerance nonetheless did not extend to Africans or Indians. Here was a society that turned protest into revolution and remade itself many times during the next centuries -- asociety that, for ninety years before 1776, was becoming America.

In 1776, the situation on the Virginia-North Carolina frontier was highly unstable and in constant turmoil as American patriots and their British adversaries contested for the allegiance of powerful Cherokee tribes which were located there. The outcome of this contest was not predictable at the outset, as each side enjoyed certain advantages and each labored under certain disabilities. The British, though lacking in sufficient manpower to pose a military threat, had for a number of years worked to secure the friendship of the Indian tribes by supplying firearms, powder and shot, and other materials. They also, somewhat ineffectually, had attempted to prohibit settlers from encroaching on Cherokee lands. The patriot group, on the other hand, had a great deal of manpower which, if organized, could demonstrate militarily to the Cherokee the advantages of an alliance with the patriots. This paper deals with British maneuvers on and intentions for the Virginia frontier in 1776 and in more depth with the reaction of Virginia patriots both on the frontier and in Williamsburg. One British goal, which seems implicit in their dealings in this area, appears to have been the creation of some type of rudimentary state, a refuge in which Loyalists and Indians could have been concentrated to ease problems of defense and supply. If such a plan had been successfully implemented, the Loyalists would have been free from coercion by the. patriots and their allegiance conserved until they could have been used in conjunction with a British military expedition, To this end British agents entered the Cherokee towns to solidify support and prevent any indiscriminate attack on the frontier which would alienate Loyalists and cause them to support the patriot government. The British were unsuccessful in achieving the latter objective, and their failure called forth a response which, removed the larger goal from the realm of possibility. The Virginia patriot forces reacted to the threat in a series of swift, energetic responses. Those settlers who formed the leading edge of settlement resisted the Indians to the utmost of their limited resources, at the same time calling for assistance from Williamsburg. The communications link between the frontier and Williamsburg was Colonel William Preston. His energetic efforts to transmit information and to facilitate the purchase of supplies for the subsequent military expedition were in a sense the key to patriot success. The government in Williamsburg showed foresight and energy in its reaction to the frontier situation. Aware that its claim of sovereignty over the frontier depended on its ability to deal with the Indians, the government launched a 2000 man force, commanded by Colonel William Christian, against the Cherokee. The success of his expedition left little doubt as to the locus of effective control of the Virginia frontier by the end of 1776.