Guns, Guns Guns

What I remember of My ancient American History, there was no militia, no fire department. When Washington was raising the "Continental Army" he had to turn away anyone without his own firearm. The Government as it was and what there was of it had no arsenal.

On the edges of the colonies, when the church bell rang everybody grabbed their gun and showed up- welcome to the militia.

I suppose my guns are for self-defense. I mostly keep them because I bought them when I was a teen, we go to the range and burn up a few hundred rounds a few times a year.

Mostly we have had some issues with bears and cougars and we are beginning the rainy season. all the critters are finishing their grocery run to lay up for winter. and the wolves are staging a comeback too. Never actually shot at one, but I have fired at the ground to run off the nosy bear cubs. My friend up the road woke up one morning to find a bear sprawled on her porch picking through her garbage.

That' s about as exciting as it gets. I mean tourist season just ended, and we could not shoot even the most obnoxious ones.

WeirdlyWired wrote:What I remember of My ancient American History, there was no militia, no fire department. When Washington was raising the "Continental Army" he had to turn away anyone without his own firearm. The Government as it was and what there was of it had no arsenal.

That is both sort of right but part of the mythical history of the US that plays rather fast and loose with the truth for the sake of "sounds better in a story".

Had they relied completely on personally owned firearms, North America would still be British.

WeirdlyWired wrote:On the edges of the colonies, when the church bell rang everybody grabbed their gun and showed up- welcome to the militia.

Yeah, as long as you ignore the part about those people spending quite a lot of time training together, their access to heavy weapons, how they "miraculously" managed to mostly cut down to a standardised type of weapon(or at least reduce the numbers down to something functional), how they magically got more ammo and powder despite the lack of manufacturing, especially of the latter, the European(mostly) mercenaries hired to shore up the locals, and so on.

The minuteman myth isn´t exactly wrong as it is grossly incomplete.

Yes, of course. France was more than willing to stick its thumb in Britain's eye. And Washington was commander of the Virginia militia and a colonel Colonial Militia as a British officer.

We areour mythology, after all. And I confess to being born and educated in Louisiana, not the best of school systems, and High School was 50 years ago. My memory sucks.

WeirdlyWired wrote:What I remember of My ancient American History, there was no militia, no fire department. When Washington was raising the "Continental Army" he had to turn away anyone without his own firearm. The Government as it was and what there was of it had no arsenal.

On the edges of the colonies, when the church bell rang everybody grabbed their gun and showed up- welcome to the militia.

Actually, there was a standing militia and a standing army. both were necessary in the ongoing war against the Indians (who still occupied the Appalachians, among other places) the French & Indian war was no long over either. Most of the regular army stayed loyal, but many, who were from the colonies, sided with their home (as happened 85 years later). There was a push for "illegal" gun & powered production. Farmers were using there cow manure to produce saltpeter while pamphlets were circulated to anyone with iron/steel milling capacity on how to make musket parts, particularly in Mass. after the British left Boston.

MAD-4A wrote:[Actually, there was a standing militia and a standing army. both were necessary in the ongoing war against the Indians (who still occupied the Appalachians, among other places) the French & Indian war was no long over either. Most of the regular army stayed loyal, but many, who were from the colonies, sided with their home (as happened 85 years later). There was a push for "illegal" gun & powered production. Farmers were using there cow manure to produce saltpeter while pamphlets were circulated to anyone with iron/steel milling capacity on how to make musket parts, particularly in Mass. after the British left Boston.

Fast forward 100 years Settlers impinging on the territory of hostile natives waiting for the cavalry to show up.

WeirdlyWired wrote:Fast forward 100 years Settlers impinging on the territory of hostile natives waiting for the cavalry to show up.

Well technically NO. the English/American settlers only took the east coast lands from those it belonged too.
Everybody has this myth that there were only 3 tribes (North American Indians, Aztec & Inca - with the Maya being gone by then) but that's not true. There were literally thousands of tribes all across both continents - constantly]at war with each other. Some joined white settlement willingly, some died due to disease - (and NO it was not 'germ warfare' - they didn't even know about germs back then it was an accident, just as the Europeans who died from Indian introduced syphilis were accidents. it worked both ways just the Europeans were use to squallier and disease - black plague - so they were better equipped for the unknown fight - the 'black death' may well have saved much of Europe by weeding out the weak before being exposed to Indian diseases.)
As for your claim about taking the land from the inland tribes - they weren't the inland tribes. By the time the white-English/American settlers pushed inland, the Indians living there were not from there. They had moved from the east coast and conquered the land of the tribes living there - the Indians invaded the Great Plains and stole it from the local tribes long before White settlers showed up to take it from the thieves!
Yes it was the White settlement in the east that was the impetus of the invasion in the first place, but that's not the same thing. A thief can't cry "stop thief". Nor can the victim of a 'thief' go to someone else and steal their stuff and say 'well mine was taken so I'm taking yours'.
Only those tribes who were on a particular patch of land before white settlement and were pushed off THAT patch of land by white settlers and did not attack another tribe to steal their patch of land, have any right to 'boo-hoo they stole our land'.
If you want to 'boo-hoo' somebody boo-hoo Spain! The Spanish Catholics invaded directly, conquered, butchered anyone who would not convert to their religion (including other - so called - Christians), forced them to change their language (which should be rejected and all so-called 'Latin American' countries should change to a different national language), destroyed their books (including who knows how much history) butchered still more who they didn't believe converted properly, worked thousands (or perhaps millions - we'll never know) to death as slaves, stole all their gold and silver, and set up a cast system which put anyone who was not born IN Spain as a 'lesser' person, even those whose heritage was pure Spanish and just born outside of Spain. They made no attempt what so-ever to make those people 'Spanish' or integrate 'their' colonies into Spain as part of the nation. They were maintained as colonist-'foreigners'.

MAD-4A wrote:

WeirdlyWired wrote:Fast forward 100 years Settlers impinging on the territory of hostile natives waiting for the cavalry to show up.

Well technically NO. the English/American settlers only took the east coast lands from those it belonged too.
Everybody has this myth that there were only 3 tribes (North American Indians, Aztec & Inca - with the Maya being gone by then) but that's not true. There were literally thousands of tribes all across both continents - constantly]at war with each other. Some joined white settlement willingly, some died due to disease - (and NO it was not 'germ warfare' - they didn't even know about germs back then it was an accident,

What bullshit revisionist history have you been getting taught???

Yes, they knew about germs. No, it was not an accident. FFS, they WROTE DOWN their plans to spread the freaking disease.


http://www.history.org/foundation/journ ... arfare.cfm

"On June 24, 1763, William Trent, a local trader, recorded in his journal that two Indian chiefs had visited the fort, urging the British to abandon the fight, but the British refused. Instead, when the Indians were ready to leave, Trent wrote: "Out of our regard for them, we gave them two Blankets and an Handkerchief out of the Small Pox Hospital. I hope it will have the desired effect.""


And...

Sir Jeffery Amherst, commander of British forces in North America, wrote July 7, 1763, probably unaware of the events at Fort Pitt: "Could it not be contrived to Send the Small Pox among those Disaffected Tribes of Indians? We must, on this occasion, Use Every Stratagem in our power to Reduce them." He ordered the extirpation of the Indians and said no prisoners should be taken. About a week later, he wrote to Bouquet: "You will Do well to try to Innoculate the Indians by means of Blanketts as well as to try Every other method that can serve to Extirpate this Execrable Race."



Please, tell us all some more about how they didn't understand germ warfare back in those days and it was all a big accident.

MAD-4A wrote: Well technically NO. the English/American settlers only took the east coast lands from those it belonged too.
Everybody has this myth that there were only 3 tribes (North American Indians, Aztec & Inca - with the Maya being gone by then) but that's not true. There were literally thousands of tribes all across both continents - constantly]at war with each other.Only those tribes who were on a particular patch of land before white settlement and were pushed off THAT patch of land by white settlers and did not attack another tribe to steal their patch of land, have any right to 'boo-hoo they stole our land'.
If you want to 'boo-hoo' somebody boo-hoo Spain! The Spanish Catholics invaded directly, conquered, butchered anyone who would not convert to their religion (including other - so called - Christians), ...

No. I do not have that Myth. No, I am NOT BOO HOOing. I am saying that 100 yeas after the Revolutionary war, More after the Seven Years War. Oops, you Anglo-centrics learned it as The French and Indian War. I am saying that As the West Was Won, wherever those Arapaho, Chiricahua ( and other Apache bands) the Sioux etc, etc, etc came from, the yankee settlers came into sometimes violent contact with them.

Since the TOPIC is Guns, guns, Guns, and since The Cavalry frequently suffered cell phone signal loss at the most inopportune times vis-a-vis settlers being attacked by hostile Aztecs, thus not being able to "ride to the rescue" at the last minute, those settlers, found it advantageous to own their own rifles for defense of their homesteads. Whomever they stole the land from. And whomever those possessors stole it from

Are we done playing willfully ignorant?

WeirdlyWired wrote:... More after the Seven Years War. Oops, you Anglo-centrics ...

I know what the 7-years war is Anglo-fob

WeirdlyWired wrote:... settlers being attacked by hostile Aztecs...

No Anglo settlers were ever attacked by Aztecs, they were in southern Mexico already conquered by the Spanish ... My point earlier, not the SAME people, anymore than French and Russians are the same people.

WeirdlyWired wrote:... wherever those Arapaho, Chiricahua ( and other Apache bands) the Sioux etc, etc, etc came
from, the yankee settlers came into sometimes violent contact with them... Whomever they stole the land from. And whomever those possessors stole it from...

As I pointed out, you can't 'steal' from a thief! They stloe the land from those who lived there, first.

WeirdlyWired wrote:... Are we done playing willfully ignorant?

you tell us.

gcomeau wrote:What bullshit revisionist history have you been getting taught???

Apparently you don't know the definition of 'revisionist history'. that would be 'revising' 'history', such as, to include your 'germ warfare' version.

gcomeau wrote:...William Trent..."
And...
Sir Jeffery Amherst, commander of British forces in North America...

So your saying that the actions of 2 men at one time (1760s)are automaticly the actions of an entire continent past and future (1600s-1800s)? OK that means that the actions of Adolf Hitler and Heinrich Himmler (2 men in Europe 1940s) are the actions of all of Europe, past and future (1800s-2000s), so you're all guilty of Mass genocide of the Jews and Slavs! Turn yourselves in to the authorities!

gcomeau wrote:Yes, they knew about germs. No, it was not an accident. FFS, they WROTE DOWN their plans to spread the freaking disease...
Please, tell us all some more about how they didn't understand germ warfare back in those days and it was all a big accident.

Why don't you look up something first? 'Germ theory' was not general knowledge until the early 1900s, with the American effort of the Panama Canal under Teddy Roosevelt. In-fact the scientist who posed it as a solution to the rampant disease infestation that was dooming the project (as it had the French attempt) was met with mass skepticism. It wasn’t until management forced everyone to ‘try’ his solutions (to bring the mosquito population down) that the cases of Malaria and Yellow Fever dwindled down to manageable levels. That was … let see … 150 years after your claim! Prior to this, the idea that diseases were caused by ‘tiny bugs’ was nothing more than postulation in labs (like sting theory in the 1970s). there were other postulations on how people got sick (well, for some with an education (like oh, IDK perhaps a high ranking Army Officer). Most, including the rank-and-file solder and settler were still uneducated buffoons living in the dark ages with ‘spirits’ & ‘witches’ causing sickness, look up something called the "Salem Witch Trials" some time. Maybe that will give you some idea about where the general population thought diseases came from. The general population had no clue about germs and even those officers you cite were not certain.

gcomeau wrote: "I hope it will have the desired effect."
"Could it not be contrived to Send the Small Pox among those Disaffected Tribes of Indians? Race."

So you go on and tell us how, people who were so poor, that they could barely afford a 1-way passage on an old rotting leaky tub to the ‘New World’, were well educated in germ warfare and willing to risk death by say “hey, give me some Small Pox and I’ll sail over to the new world and give it to the Indians so you can come later and take their land.“ How idiotic.
No one sailing to the 'New World' knew they had any disease at the time, and no one who they sailed with would have allowed them on the boat if they had thought they were disease. Ever hear of anything called an 'incubation period'? No settler ever sailed sick! The Capitan wouldn't have let them, duh.