Women in the Home Front
In chapter six the beginning of the American Revolution was discussed as well as the outcome. But one thing in particular truly grabbed my interest and that would be the home front or in other words, how the war affected those at home. The had greatly affected the women because for the first time, the men were not present in their lives to handle the usual work around the house as well as the men not being there just for companionship. The women then had to learn how to handle the "outdoor affairs" and learned how to manage the family's money and other resources. Thus because of this more hand on approach to taking care of the family and house hold, the women had started to feel more connected and pridefull of the house calling the property 'ours' instead of 'yours' when writing to their husbands. Not only did women had to sacrefice their luxuries such as ribbons and gloves but they also suffered shortages of things that they needed such as flour and soap. Not only were the women at home in danger of living without their everyday necesseties, but they also were in danger of their health. Smallpox and many other kinds of diseases had endangered the children near the army camps causing the risk of getting infected by the diseases or being indangered of the complicated process of getting the vaccine for the diseases. The women in the home front had dealt with very difficult times and challenges which i believe had made them stronger women and began to gain a form of self independence, making the way for the woman after them to be stronger women as well.

What was most interesting in what i learned in class was finding out how little of the population in the colonies were actually against the British crown's rule. When I was taught about the American Revolution in previous classes, it had always seemed as if the majority of the colonists were revolting against Great Britain. Instead, only forty percent of the people wanted to be free from the rule of the crown; which was the same percentage of the people who wanted to stay intact with Britain! The rest of the twenty percent were people who simply did not care one way or the other. This information is just baffaling and somewhat dissapointing for me. To be told that the American Revolution was a rather conservative revolution and the colonists were simply over reacting over having to pay taxes is very upsetting. As I think on it now, the United States became independant and free over something that is very crucial to our economy today and most Americans do on a daily basis. Was the revolution then pointless? Most Americans at least, pay taxes on one thing or another whether it being buying a new car or picking up a bag of chips at a local grocer. I will answer my own retorical question above; no, i do not believe that the American Revolution was pointless. It brought about many good things such as rights for the people and freedom to live life justly, but it is a topic that is still very baffaling to me. How is it that something so huge could be started by something so small such as the concept of tax that is still done today. I suppose that is the greatest moral of the American Revolution, that it is not exactly what the colonists were fighting about, but rather that the colonists stood up for what they believed in, made their voice be heard and stuck with it until there was an affected change. Something us Americans would not be able to do if those 'overreacting' political activists had not challenged the British law.