L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, JULY 13, 2017 www.italoamericano.org 24 L'Italo-Americano LA VITA ITALIANA TRADITIONS HISTORY CULTURE D ear Readers, The July 4th Celebrations remind me to refresh your memory and mine about the Declaration of Independence signed July 4, 1776 in Philadelphia. There is a lot to learn about Italian and Italian American con- tributions to the American Revolutionary War. Although the colonists declared themselves independent of England and set up "The United States of America", a long war followed and it was not until April 30, 1789 that George Washington – "first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his country- men" – became the first President of the United States. He took the first U.S. presi- dential oath of office on the bal- cony of the City Hall in New York – the new nation's tempo- rary capital. From 1789 to 1790, the presidential mansion was located at No. 1 Cherry Street, New York; John Adams of Massachusetts was Vice President. *** Columbus reached America in 1492. When heads of European countries discovered a "new world," many of them tried to get a share of it. A race of sorts began. Spain took posses- sion of South America, Central America, Mexico and all the southern part of the modern United States. Then France, Holland and England wanted a share, but could not agree upon a division that would satisfy all three. In a war between England and Holland, England won the Dutch colonies of New York, New Jersey, Delaware and Pennsylvania. Then England drove out the French: the King sent a regiment to chase the French from the Ohio River Valley. Eventually England, too, would go. A few years after the war with France, the English colonists (Yankees) began to quarrel with their mother coun- try. The King of England had won the war against France, but had ended up deeply in debt and wanted the colonists to help pay for it. In 1765, he passed the Stamp Act according to which, when some kind of goods such as wills, playing cards, newspa- pers, almanacs or advertise- ments printed in newspapers were bought or sold, they needed to be validated with a specific, purchasable stamp. King George began appoint- ing officers in America to sell the stamps, but mobs visited their homes and very few were bold enough to sell them after that. Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, on business in London, told the King he had no business taxing the colonists, for these "Sons of Liberty had already paid more than their share of the English/French War by furnishing men and supplies for the army, and for settling America and bringing it under the English flag." The English King and gov- ernment gave up the Stamp Tax, but never stopped trying to get more money from the colonists. Soon, another law taxing certain goods brought to America from England was passed. This law enraged the colonists to the point they stopped buying goods from their motherland, until English merchants begged the govern- ment to give up the law. "Okay," said King George, "but the Tea Tax stays." In December 1773, ships carrying tea arrived in Charleston, Philadelphia and New York. When people refused to buy the English "Royal Tea," it was stored in damp cellars to rot. In Boston, though, after the colonists asked the governor to send the tea back to England and he refused, a large party of men dressed up as Native Americans boarded the ships. With toma- hawks waving, they dumped 342 chests of tea overboard into the bay: it was the Boston Tea Party. Boston patriot Paul Revere had taken his "midnight ride" on April 8, 1775, the eve of the Battle of Lexington and Concord. The quarrel with England had been going on for ten years: the July 4th, 1776 signing of the Declaration of Independence just formalized it. At the outbreak of the Revolution, Italians and Italian- Americans with anglicized spelling of their names were early getting their share of fatal firepower from the British sol- diers: James Bracco, for instance, was killed in action on October 26, 1776. But Italy contributed more than men to the American Revolution. Even before the con- flict started, Italy was a source of inspiration to American patriots because of the struggle waged by Pasquale Paoli and his fellow Corsicans for independence. *** Many men from France with Italian surnames fought during the American Revolution. Some of them were probably the off- spring of Italians who settled in France, or Italian citizens who assumed or were given French surnames. To ascertain the names of Italians who fought under the French flag is difficult because of the way their names were written or copied: Philip Phinizy, who came over with Rouchambeau, was in fact "Finizzi." In 1903, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs published a list of soldiers and sailors who fought under the French flag dur- ing the American Revolution. The document, titled "Les Combattants Français de la Guerre Americaine 1778-1783," contains scores of Italian names. British records also provide additional evidence of Italian participation in the Revolution. Whenever the English impris- oned an enemy, they kept a record of his name and rank in a ledger. Among the Italian-born volunteers to bear arms against the British were Filippo Mazzei, Carlo Bellini and Vincenzo Rossi, who joined Patrick Henry's forces. Newspaper articles by Mazzei and his close friend Thomas Jefferson inspired the formation of independent mili- tary companies of volunteers in every county of Virginia. When British troops landed at Hampton in 1775, Mazzei, Bellini, Rossi and James Madison joined the company of Albemarle County as privates. In 1778, Bellini became clerk of foreign corre- spondence for Virginia and the first professor of modern lan- guages at the College of William and Mary. In 1779, Mazzei received a letter from Governor Patrick Henry asking him to go to Europe to seek foreign aid for Virginia. Mazzei accepted. On June 20th, Mazzei, his wife and his daughter set sail for Europe. When their ship, the "Johnston," was thirty miles from Virginia's coast, an English privateer over- took the vessel. The British imprisoned Mazzei for three months on Long Island. After they released him in mid- September, he and his family sailed for France. Mazzei visited high officials in Genoa and Florence, and wrote many articles in favor of the American cause. He busied himself gathering useful political and military data, which he sent to his friend Jefferson, the new governor of Virginia. Mazzei advocated a military plan that called for coordinated action by the French navy and American army as the best way to defeat the British. He told his plan to Jefferson in a letter dated May 20, 1780. Mazzei stressed that "nothing could be done without superiority on water [...]," and also gave a sketch of his plans to the French General Comte de Rochambeau. American and French forces applied this strate- gy successfully in the Battle of Yorktown.

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