Gun Ownership in Early America
A Survey of Manuscript Militia Returns
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3580725 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Robert H Churchill (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2003 |
| Volume | 60 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 615 |
| Publication date | 2003-07-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The William and Mary Quarterly (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0043-5597 • E-ISSN: 1933-7698 |
| Publisher | JSTOR (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.2307/3491553 |
| OpenAlex | W1967003063 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 6 |
N 1996, Michael Bellesiles's Journal of American History article on gun ownership in early America startled many early American historians. Bellesiles found that probate inventories and militia records from the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries strongly indicated that guns were scarce in early America and that gun ownership was exceptional. Controversy has since raged over Bellesiles's research, which he published in more elaborate form in Arming America: The Origins of a National Gun Culture. Critics have focused primarily on Bellesiles's use of probate inventories. Yet Bellesiles's research was innovative in its use of militia returns, documents seldom cited in the military histories of the period. Bellesiles argues that available returns provided additional evidence of guns' scarcity.' The term return is a generic military reference to reports of information requested by superior officers and by the civil officers of the colony or state. Typical categories of reporting included results of officer elections, records of provisions consumed, and weekly reports of men fit
Business · Demographic economics · Economics · Political science · American History and Culture
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Once More unto the Breach, Dear Friends
Counting Guns
American Arms Manufacturing and the Onset of the War of 1812
| Unique citing works | 6 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,25 |
| Citation span | 2002 - 2014 (13) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 6 |