My Grandfather was a man grown before the Wright Brothers flew, and lived long enough to see a man walk on the moon. He never learned to drive a car, but there was no one better with a team, be it horse, mule, or oxen. He forgot more about American history than today's history professors will ever know.
One of the regrets of my adult life is that I should have listened better and learned more of what he taught me as a kid.
And, he was an expert in Colonial history. The family joke was it was because he was there...but of course, he wasn't, being born about 20 years after the Civil War.
Anyway, point here, is some thing he told me about Knox and the cannon, and that was that the only way humanly possible to take those guns from Ticonderoga to Boston overland in less than a year was to do it in the winter. Our farm was about 20 miles north of Saratoga, and so about 50 miles south of Ticonderoga, and I know well the wild country of that region. To move anything heavy, without roads, using animal transport, you do it in the winter. Ox drawn sledges over the frozen ground and through the snow. In summer too much of the ground is too soft. Swamps are not just southern things. Even breaking through the ice of the frozen creeks and surviving the cold is less work than trying to move ton weights of iron on wheels through the woods on soft ground in warmer weather.
TODAY its popular revisionist history to look at the Founders as "rich white slave owners" who only rebelled for personal gain. but that not the truth. They pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to the cause of freedom and liberty for all, and the fact that they couldn't create that for everyone right away in no way cheapens or lessens their accomplishments or their sacrifices.
American citizens become soldiers in time of need, and no one on earth has ever done more for more people than we have. I served, and both my children have served, one still is on active duty.
I don't accept thanks for my service, and I don't thank Veterans for being Veterans, because I don't believe in thanking people for simply doing what is right. I DO thank those who took injury in the service of our country, most humbly and sincerely. And I honor and revere those who gave all. That's what's right, and what's proper.
sorry for the rant, its just one of my "hot button" issues...but that doesn't make it any less true..
