Conceived in Liberty errata

82 places where research for Conceived in Liberty Companion checked Murray Rothbard’s Conceived in Liberty against primary and other sources and found it wrong, compressed, or in conflict with them. Page numbers are the 2011 single-volume Mises Institute edition. Rothbard’s text, and Rothbard’s account on each companion page, are left as he wrote them; these notes sit beside them.

Errors: the record contradicts Rothbard

Volume I, chapter 21, pp. 173–176 · the companion page: Rothbard says The General Court sent a ship to Salem to seize Roger Williams.; The evidence The ship lay at Nantasket; a pinnace was sent to Salem to bring him to it and found him gone three days earlier.; Source Winthrop’s journal
Volume I, chapter 42, pp. 313–314 · the companion page: Rothbard says New Amsterdam surrendered on 7 September 1664.; The evidence 8 September (Monday), New Style; the articles were signed 6 September.; Source Brodhead; Fiske
Volume I, chapter 48, p. 353 · the companion page: Rothbard says Gove and Nathaniel Ladd rode to and fro between Hampton and Exeter with a band of eleven, crying “liberty and reformation.”; The evidence Gove rode into Hampton at the head of twelve mounted Exeter men with a trumpet sounding. Ladd is not in the account, and neither is the cry. Randolph was Gove’s enemy, but Gove “owned the matter of fact” at his trial.; Source Randolph’s report to the Lords of Trade; Bouton 1867, p. 495
Volume I, chapter 49, p. 358 · the companion page: Rothbard says Danforth’s stand against sending agents to London came in January 1681.; The evidence The General Court session opened 15 February 1681/2 (Old Style), vote 20 March. The King’s letter demanding agents is dated 21 October 1681 and was read at that February session, so January 1681 is impossible.; Source Hutchinson 1764, vol. I, p. 334
Volume I, chapter 57, p. 413 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Boston revolt against Andros broke out on April 28, 1689 (said twice).; The evidence 18 April 1689, Old Style. 28 April is the New Style equivalent, and Rothbard’s own text dates the Declaration 18 April on the same page, so he mixes calendars.; Source Byfield 1689, Andros Tracts I, p. 3; Hutchinson 1764, vol. I, p. 374
Volume I, chapter 62, p. 470 · the companion page: Rothbard says Judge Nathaniel Byfield was hooted down a Newport street for freeing a French prize (placed after Dudley’s 1702 governorship, no date).; The evidence The prize was Spanish, the year 1705 (27 June, Old Style), and Byfield condemned it to its captors on Dudley’s advice. The crowd hooted him for first declaring Governor Cranston’s privateering commission void. Three errors in one anecdote.; Source Byfield’s own letter of 19 July 1705, RI Colonial Records III, pp. 537-540
Volume II, chapter 20, p. 591 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Enfield jail rescue came in 1758.; The evidence The kidnapping of Corbin and Bodley was the night of 25 January 1759 (the DNCR marker gives 24 January) and the jail break followed on 14 May 1759. Rothbard also has Corbin arrest the four men himself; the histories say he sued his captors, a court accused them, and they were jailed at Enfield.; Source NCpedia, ‘Enfield Riots’ and ‘Corbin, Francis’; Wikipedia, ‘Enfield, North Carolina’; DNCR marker E-67
Volume II, chapter 22, p. 597 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Stono rebels “raided an arsenal, killing two guards” (leader “Jimmy”).; The evidence They surprised a warehouse belonging to Mr. Hutchinson at Stono, a store selling small arms and powder, and killed Robert Bathurst and Mr. Gibbs, the men at it; the 1739 account calls the leader Jemmy and has the band “above Sixty, some say a hundred” at its peak.; Source “An Account of the Negroe Insurrection in South Carolina” (1739), Candler, Colonial Records of Georgia 22 pt. 2, pp. 232-236
Volume II, chapter 42, p. 764 · the companion page: Rothbard says At New Smyrna in August 1768 “a brutal overseer who tried to stop the revolt was killed”, and Governor Grant had “only the two leaders, Forni and Corona” killed.; The evidence No overseer is killed in Turnbull’s own letters to Grant (22 and 25 August 1768): his manager Mr. Cutter was wounded in the head, hand and groin, two mutineers were killed, and a Greek priest drowned. Grant’s report of 14 January 1769 has Forni and Giuseppe Massadoli executed and Corona (“Clatha Corrona”), George Stephanopoli and Elia Medici reprieved. The night was Friday 19 August.; Source Turnbull to Grant, 22 and 25 Aug 1768; Grant to Hillsborough, 14 Jan 1769 (Florida History Online, UNF)
Volume III, chapter 4, p. 794 · the companion page: Rothbard says The government “was finally forced to repeal the provocative tax two years later” (the 1763 cider tax).; The evidence Repealed in July 1766, three years later.; Source Exeter Working Papers in Book History, ‘Cider’; Wikipedia, ‘Cider Bill of 1763’
Volume III, chapter 44, p. 958 · the companion page: Rothbard says Commissioner Robinson “set upon Otis with a gang of toughs and beat him unmercifully”, and “from this assault Otis never recovered, having been rendered permanently insane.”; The evidence Otis walked into the British Coffee House on 5 September 1769 after printing that he had a natural right to break Robinson’s head, and both men carried canes. Robinson struck at him while several men held him and others used cutlasses and canes; Gridley came to Otis’s aid. Otis won £2,000 damages and waived them for a written apology. Rothbard’s own ch. 22 (p. 867) already notes Otis’s instability in 1765, so the assault did not begin it.; Source *Boston Gazette*, 11 Sept 1769, and Hutchinson, via Colonial Society of Massachusetts, ‘The Caning of James Otis Jr.’; Adams Papers editorial note
Volume III, chapter 56, p. 1031 · the companion page: Rothbard says At the Boston Tea Party “no other property and no person was at all harmed.”; The evidence Two people were hurt: carpenter John Crane was knocked senseless when a hoist gave way, and Charles O’Conner of Charlestown, caught pocketing tea, was stripped of his coat and kicked. No one died; the ships and other cargo were untouched.; Source Carp, *Defiance of the Patriots*, ch. 6; Hawkes, p. 40; Andrews in Drake, *Tea Leaves*, p. LXX
Volume IV, chapter 58, p. 1444 · the companion page: Rothbard says Tarleton chased Morgan ‘with more than 3,300 men’, outnumbering Morgan’s 1,000 or so ‘by over three to one’ in trained regulars.; The evidence Tarleton marched with about 1,100 to 1,150 officers and men, about 300 of them cavalry (NPS Cowpens; Wikipedia, ‘Battle of Cowpens’), a little more than Morgan’s force, not three times it. Rothbard’s own total for the British loss, 900 men or ‘nearly nine-tenths of their force’ (p. 1445), fits about 1,000, not 3,300.; Source NPS, ‘The Battle of Cowpens’; Wikipedia, ‘Battle of Cowpens’ (summaries read through a fetch tool)
Volume IV, chapter 62, p. 1461 · the companion page: Rothbard says Cornwallis ‘surrendered his force’ on 19 October ‘as the British band appropriately played “The World Turned Upside Down”’.; The evidence Cornwallis refused to attend, claiming illness, and General O’Hara led the army out; the surrender articles asked for ‘a British or German march’ and no record names the tune (Wikipedia, ‘The World Turned Upside Down’: the story first appears a century after the surrender). Thacher (19 October 1781) has the British marching ‘with shouldered arms, colors cased, and drums beating a British march’. The spec shows an unnamed general officer and attributes the tune in the copy.; Source Thacher, *Military Journal*, 19 Oct 1781 (Teaching American History); Wikipedia, ‘Siege of Yorktown’ and ‘The World Turned Upside Down’
Volume IV, chapter 63, p. 1463 · the companion page: Rothbard says The killings at Gnadenhutten were ‘the next morning, March 7’; ninety Moravian Indians were killed, ‘including 61 women and children’; a hundred settlers marched.; The evidence Wikipedia, Revolutionary War Journal and Emerging Revolutionary War put the militia’s entry on 7 March, the night of hymns on 7-8 March and the killings on 8 March, and count 96 dead (28 men, 29 women, 39 children, so 68 women and children), by about 160 militia under Lt. Col. David Williamson.; Source Wikipedia, ‘Gnadenhutten massacre’; Revolutionary War Journal, ‘Gnadenhutten Massacre’; Emerging Revolutionary War, ‘Visiting a Tragedy: Gnadenhutten, OH’ (read through a fetch tool)
Volume IV, chapter 64, p. 1469: Rothbard says The evacuation of Charleston on 14 December 1782 took ’300 British ships’.; The evidence The NPS and the Charleston County Public Library count about 130 vessels carrying about 14,000 people.; Source NPS, ‘Liberty Won and Lost: The British Evacuation of Charleston’; CCPL, ‘Charleston’s Victory Day, Part 2’ (read through a fetch tool)

Compressions and loose phrasing

Volume I, chapter 11, p. 97 · the companion page: Rothbard says Bacon forced the commission “under bayonet.”; The evidence None of the four accounts (Mathew, the Commissioners, Sherwood, Ludwell) mentions a bayonet: fusils cocked and presented, and swords. Figurative, but anachronistic if read literally for 1676.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume I, chapter 12, p. 110 · the companion page: Rothbard says Tony “sat down and refused to rise.”; The evidence The deposition says he laid himself down (Maryland Provincial Court, 1658).; Source Maryland Provincial Court, 1658
Volume I, chapter 15, p. 122 · the companion page: Rothbard says “On August 1, Joseph and the Council surrendered.”; The evidence Two surrenders: the State House garrison at St. Mary’s (27 July, Old Style), then the fort at Mattapany about eight miles on (1 August). Rothbard folds them into one (Council Proceedings vol. 8, pp. 225-229).; Source Council Proceedings vol. 8, pp. 225-229
Volume I, chapter 22, p. 182 · the companion page: Rothbard says Her enemies on the General Court duly “tried” her, “convicted her of sedition and contempt,” and banished her.; The evidence The examination record names no offense called sedition or contempt (those were the grounds on which the court had convicted Wheelwright in March 1637). Winthrop gave the court’s grounds as “the troublesomeness of her spirit and the danger of her course amongst us,” and the sentence banished her “as being a woman not fit for our society.” The Famous Trials account says the court was less than clear about the crime.; Source “The Examination of Mrs. Anne Hutchinson at the Court at Newtown,” November 1637, transcription at Famous Trials (UMKC); Famous Trials, “The Trial of Anne Hutchinson (1637): An Account” (both accessed 2026-10-02)
Volume I, chapter 46, pp. 343–344 · the companion page: Rothbard says Andros was “confronted” at Fort Saybrook; he read the duke’s charter, then Connecticut answered with a proclamation.; The evidence The protest was read on the shore near the fort, after Andros had the King’s charter and then the duke’s commission read over Captain Bull’s order to forbear (Trumbull 1852, appendix, pp. 583-584).; Source Trumbull 1852, appendix, pp. 583-584
Volume II, chapter 13, p. 569 · the companion page: Rothbard says In “the spring of 1756” Franklin marched his regiment to a meeting of the independents “and forced the participants to disperse.”; The evidence The Franklin Papers headnote (quoting the Pennsylvania Gazette of 4 March 1756) dates the march to Saturday 28 February 1756, after the regiment’s first review, and has the proposers already gone when the column halted before the Academy. No confrontation is recorded. Read through an extract of the headnote, not the Gazette itself.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume II, chapter 31, pp. 675–676 · the companion page: Rothbard says At the 1758 yearly meeting the conservatives seemed to be winning until Woolman rose and “swept the day”; the meeting appointed “an energetic committee, headed by Woolman.”; The evidence Woolman’s Journal (ch. V): several faithful Friends had already spoken, he spoke after them, “no opposition was publicly made,” a fuller minute was passed, and “the names of several Friends” were entered for the visits; no chairman is named. The session sat at Burlington (Tolles, Friends Journal 1958), not Philadelphia.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume II, chapter 35, pp. 708–709 · the companion page: Rothbard says Dunbar and his men seized the woodsmen’s timber near Exeter in 1734, the woodsmen struck back, and “Dunbar himself” was “endangered.”; The evidence Two separate days: Dunbar visited the Copyhold saw-mill, the lumbermen fired guns and he left; then ten men he had hired were beaten in Gilman’s tavern at Exeter at about nine on the night of 23 April 1734 by some thirty men disguised as Indians. Dunbar was not at the tavern (Exeter Historical Society blog quoting the proclamation; Calendar of State Papers, Colonial, 1734, no. 230).; Source Exeter Historical Society blog quoting the proclamation; Calendar of State Papers, Colonial, 1734, no. 230
Volume III, chapter 2, p. 786 · the companion page: Rothbard says Ecuyer “generously gave two smallpox-infected blankets to the Delaware Indians,” and “soon smallpox raged among the Delawares and the Shawnees.”; The evidence Trent’s journal (24 June 1763) records two blankets and a handkerchief “out of the Small Pox Hospital” given at a conference just outside the fort, and only “I hope it will have the desired effect.” Turtle’s Heart, who received them, is not recorded as falling ill; that the outbreak followed from the gift is not established.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume III, chapter 31, p. 898 · the companion page: Rothbard says Seizing collector Dry, the Cape Fear association forced him and Captain Lobb to release the three vessels.; The evidence Three days: on 19 February 1766 Dry’s desk at Brunswick was broken open and the clearances taken; on the 20th a committee went aboard the Viper and Lobb gave up the vessels that evening; the oaths followed on the 21st (Saunders, Colonial Records of North Carolina 7, preface pp. viii-ix).; Source Saunders, *Colonial Records of North Carolina* 7, preface pp. viii-ix
Volume III, chapter 39, p. 938 · the companion page: Rothbard says Hancock “refused to let customs officials search his ship Lydia,” with “numerous followers.”; The evidence The tidesmen asked only to stay with the cargo below; Hancock ordered them to keep to the deck, and his crew brought one up with “eight or 10 people all unarmed” about (Sewall’s letter of 17 June 1768, via HUB History and an Adams Papers note).; Source Sewall’s letter of 17 June 1768, via HUB History and an Adams Papers note
Volume III, chapter 41, p. 946 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Boston town meeting of September 12 (place unnamed) ordered every citizen to bear arms.; The evidence The meeting ran two days and its resolutions are dated 13 September. It met in Faneuil Hall, with the town’s arms in chests in the middle of the hall; an informer says the crowd (about three thousand) was too big and it adjourned to Old South (Bernard to Hillsborough, 16 Sept 1768; Avalon Project).; Source Bernard to Hillsborough, 16 Sept 1768; Avalon Project
Volume III, chapter 51, p. 1005 · the companion page: Rothbard says At Hillsboro the Regulators “threatened Judge Richard Henderson, who fled town.”; The evidence Henderson’s own account has him holding court in the packed room until 3 or 4 pm and leaving the next night; Fanning was dragged down the courthouse steps and beaten in the street (Henderson as quoted at amrevnc.com; Virginia Gazette, 25 Oct 1770; both read as summaries).; Source Henderson as quoted at amrevnc.com; *Virginia Gazette*, 25 Oct 1770; both read as summaries
Volume III, chapter 57, p. 1034 · the companion page: Rothbard says The first tea captain, Lockyer, “promised not to enter the port and sailed away.”; The evidence The Nancy reached Sandy Hook on 18 April 1774 and Lockyer was escorted into the city to apologize; he sailed for England a few days later with Chambers, after the London’s tea was dumped (Fraunces Tavern Museum).; Source Fraunces Tavern Museum
Volume III, chapter 62, p. 1059 · the companion page: Rothbard says “Twenty thousand men of the western towns of Massachusetts quickly gathered in Cambridge to march on Boston.”; The evidence About 4,000 gathered at Cambridge, most from the nearby towns (Lt. Gov. Oliver: “about 4000 people”; Johnston 2009). Twenty thousand is Dr. Benjamin Church’s figure for the whole countryside on the march (to Samuel Adams, 4 Sept 1774).; Source to Samuel Adams, 4 Sept 1774
Volume III, chapter 69, p. 1092 · the companion page: Rothbard says At Lexington eight were killed and “eight wounded”, of “seventy men”.; The evidence Eight killed and ten wounded, of 77 (National Park Service).; Source National Park Service
Volume III, chapter 71, p. 1110 · the companion page: Rothbard says Ethan Allen “raised his rifle high.”; The evidence The Green Mountain Boys carried flintlock fowling pieces and muskets; rifles were rare in the North. Painted as a long flintlock.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 8, p. 1159 · the companion page: Rothbard says “Virtually an entire Pennsylvania company mutinied to try to free one of their own, and several regiments were needed to disarm and convict the Pennsylvanians,” whose penalty was “less than a week’s pay.”; The evidence Two modern accounts that draw on the general orders and court-martial (HUB History, episode 256; Journal of the American Revolution, ‘Riflemen Run Riot’) date it to Sunday 10 September 1775 and count thirty-two riflemen, of Captain Ross’s company and others, who set out from Prospect Hill for the main guard at Cambridge. Washington, with Generals Lee and Greene, caught them on a wooded hill half a mile out and ordered them to ground arms, ‘and they did it immediately’; a rifle company and two New England regiments ringed them. Thirty-three men were fined twenty shillings and one, John Leamon, jailed six days. Read through fetch summaries.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 14, p. 1186 · the companion page: Rothbard says Lee’s ‘issuance of mass loyalty oaths’ at Newport, with a ‘public oath’ and three arrests.; The evidence The Journal of the American Revolution account (2020, through a fetch summary) has Lee summoning eight leading Loyalists to the Parade before the Colony House on the evening of 25 December 1775, exempting two, and arresting the three who refused; his own letter to Congress admits he administered the oath ‘without any authority’. No mass oath at Newport appears in the sources read.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 15, p. 1188 · the companion page: Rothbard says Sears ‘collected 100 men from Connecticut and conducted a daring raid into New York City, smashing the Tory print shops.’; The evidence The Pennsylvania Journal of 6 December 1775 (as reproduced on americanhistorycentral.com) has seventy-five horsemen entering the city at noonday with bayonets fixed, after sixteen New Haven men had gone ahead with Sears to Westchester, and a single printing office, James Rivington’s, from which a detachment ‘brought off’ the type; later summaries add the press destroyed. Dated 23 November 1775 in the secondary accounts read (one gives the 27th).; Source one gives the 27th
Volume IV, chapter 17, pp. 1197–1198 · the companion page: Rothbard says Dunmore’s naval fire on New Year’s Day ‘destroyed fifty houses’, the rebels ‘nearly nine hundred’; the Virginia Convention made the burning of the rest ‘official’ in February.; The evidence Wikipedia (‘Burning of Norfolk’) has the Patriots destroying 863 buildings (about £120,000) and the British 19; Encyclopedia Virginia has the Committee of Safety approving the destruction on 15 January and the remaining buildings burned on 6 February, 1,279 of 1,333 structures lost in all. Rothbard’s nine hundred fits; his fifty for Dunmore is high. Read through fetch summaries.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 21, p. 1212 · the companion page: Rothbard says Mowat “entered Falmouth on the October 16. Giving the townspeople one day to evacuate, he shelled and fired the town until its over two hundred houses, eleven ships, and wharves and warehouses were completely burned.”; The evidence Mowat arrived on 16 October with an ultimatum of two hours, a town committee bargained for time, and the bombardment began at 9:40 on the morning of 18 October, lasting until about six that evening. The burned town was some 400 buildings, about 136 to 140 houses and 280 others, with nearly all public buildings and two thirds of the private houses (Wikipedia, ‘Burning of Falmouth’; Boston Public Library research guide; Discover Concord; Encyclopedia Virginia). Rothbard’s ‘over two hundred houses’ is high; his ‘eleven ships’ fits ‘almost a dozen small ships and boats’.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 54, p. 1429 · the companion page: Rothbard says Clinton’s ‘July 3 proclamation’, then ‘the stern proclamation of June 3’, for the same edict on paroled prisoners.; The evidence Clinton’s third proclamation, releasing paroled prisoners from parole unless they took the oath, is dated 3 June 1780 (The Revolutionary South; encyclopedia.com, ‘British Proclamations of May and June 1780’, via summaries). Rothbard’s ‘July 3’ is a slip within the chapter.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 61, p. 1452 · the companion page: Rothbard says ‘Col. Hezekiah Maham’ thought of the tower at Fort Watson.; The evidence Maham was a major in April 1781 (Revolutionary War Journal, quoting Lee: ‘Major Maham’) and later a lieutenant colonel (Wikipedia, ‘Hezekiah Maham’).; Source Wikipedia, ‘Hezekiah Maham’
Volume IV, chapter 63, p. 1463 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Moravians ‘gathered in their chapel’ on assurance of removal to Pittsburgh.; The evidence The other accounts read hold the men in one building and the women and children in another overnight, and the killings were in two ‘killing houses’ (Wikipedia; Emerging Revolutionary War). The spec paints one log building with families in it, as Rothbard has it.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 64, p. 1469: Rothbard says ‘About 5,000 of their Negro slaves’ left Charleston with the British.; The evidence The NPS and the CCPL count over 5,000 people of African descent (5,333 by the British count), most enslaved by Loyalists and carried off, but some free by British protection after fleeing to the British lines, who went on to New York, Canada, the Caribbean and Sierra Leone.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 67, p. 1490 · the companion page: Rothbard says Messier, ‘a tea merchant from New York’, had his home invaded in May 1777 ‘by a party led by two soldiers’ who took tea at a price they called fair.; The evidence The first visit, on Monday 19 May 1777, was at his new store in his house on Wappingers Creek, Dutchess County, near Poughkeepsie: about two dozen women with two militiamen (Smith counts 22 women and three Continental soldiers), with Mrs. Mesier keeping the shop. The throat-grab came on the 20th and the break-in and beating of Mesier and his servants on the 22nd. Read in summaries of the Wappingers Historical Society and Barbara Clark Smith; his deposition of 23 May 1777 was not opened.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 68, p. 1501 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Fort Wilson mob ‘seized three Tories’; ‘several persons were killed’.; The evidence The Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia says four merchants were seized and paraded (John Drinker first, at the Quaker meeting house); six died and 17 to 19 were wounded (Wikipedia, ‘Fort Wilson Riot’). Read through fetch summaries.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume V, chapter 7, pp. 85–92 · the companion page: Rothbard says Congress “sent troops to the frontier to burn the cabins of the squatters” in 1785, with the settlers stubbornly returning.; The evidence The first removal, Ensign John Armstrong’s 31 March to 12 April 1785 trip from Fort McIntosh, found forty armed men across from Wheeling, read them his orders and took their promise to leave by 19 April; the secondary histories say he burned few cabins and spared those whose owners promised to go. Burnings are reported in later 1785 detachments, and the squatters did rebuild once the army left. Rothbard’s sentence fits the whole campaign, not Armstrong’s reading. Page range is the chapter span (ch. 8 begins p. 93).; Source ch. 8 begins p. 93
Volume V, chapter 11, p. 116 · the companion page: Rothbard says At Springfield on 26 September 1786 General Shepard held the courthouse with 800 men against ‘approximately 1,100 rebels’, and ‘General Shepard surrendered the courthouse’ when the court agreed to close. (Volume V, 2019 edition; page numbers equal the PDF’s.); The evidence Wikipedia (‘Shays’s Rebellion’) has Shepard with about 300 men at the opening and Shays and Day recruiting a similar number, his force growing to about 800 only later; other accounts say about 600 rebels. The judges first postponed and adjourned on the 28th without hearing a case, and Shepard then withdrew to the armory, so ‘surrendered’ folds a withdrawal two days on into the 26th.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume V, chapter 25, pp. 221–222 · the companion page: Rothbard says ‘A Federalist Philadelphia mob’ seized McCalmont and Miley, ‘the radical defectors’, and ‘dragged them into the Assembly to make a compulsory quorum.’; The evidence The Speaker sent the sergeant-at-arms and an assistant clerk first; they found the two at Major Alexander Boyd’s lodgings on Sixth Street, and only when both refused did a crowd of Constitution men break in and push them to the State House. Once there McCalmont offered silver for leave to go, was refused and made a dash for the door, and the men at the door barred his way. McCalmont sat for Franklin County, cut from Cumberland in 1784, not ‘Cumberland’. (McMaster and Stone 1888 via Teaching American History; American Heritage, Feb. 1971; CSAC, University of Wisconsin; all read through fetch summaries.); Source McMaster and Stone 1888 via Teaching American History; American Heritage, Feb. 1971; CSAC, University of Wisconsin; all read through fetch summaries.

Conflicts between sources, unresolved

Volume I, chapter 20, p. 168 · the companion page: Rothbard says The sea captain put in the stocks for kissing his wife on the Sabbath (no name, date or town).; The evidence Earle (1891) names Captain Kemble of Boston, 1656, with no record cited; the New England Historical Society says Charlestown. Rothbard quotes a phrase he does not source.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume I, chapter 23, p. 189 · the companion page: Rothbard says Gorton’s courtroom melee “at the end of 1640.”; The evidence Janes, citing the Portsmouth Town Records, says August 1640.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume I, chapter 27, p. 219 · the companion page: Rothbard says Rothbard credits Roger Williams with “his great service in keeping the Narragansetts out of the war”, and has Mason joined only by “some dissident Indians.”; The evidence Mason wrote that about five hundred Indians marched with the English, Narragansetts among them; many Narragansetts turned back at the Pawcatuck ford, and after the fight all but Uncas (Onkos) and his Mohegans deserted him. Narragansett warriors were on the march to Mystic, though they did not fight in the fort.; Source John Mason, A Brief History of the Pequot War, in Charles Orr, ed., History of the Pequot War (1897), pp. 25, 31; Orr, Introduction, pp. xv-xvii
Volume I, chapter 27, p. 219 · the companion page: Rothbard says Mason’s attack ended by “slaughtering some six hundred Indians, the bulk of them old men, women, and children.”; The evidence Mason put the dead at six or seven hundred, “as some of themselves confessed”; Underhill reported about four hundred souls in the fort and not above five escaping. The two eyewitnesses disagree with each other; Rothbard’s six hundred sits inside Mason’s range and above Underhill’s.; Source John Mason, in Orr 1897, p. 31; John Underhill, Newes from America (London, 1638)
Volume I, chapter 43, pp. 323–324 · the companion page: Rothbard says Carteret granted town land to Robert Michel; townsmen tore down his fence and part of his house.; The evidence The Cyclopedia of New Jersey names Richard Mitchell and mentions only the fence.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume II, chapter 7, p. 541 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Palatines, ‘led by Weiser’, drove out the landlords and ‘gave Sheriff Adams a thorough trouncing’ (no year).; The evidence Local histories tell it as a riot led by the village women (Magdalene Zeh), ending with the sheriff carried out of the valley on a fence rail, and date it 1715 (Wikipedia’s Weiser Sr. entry, warrant July 1715) or 1717 (NY State Historical Markers).; Source NY State Historical Markers
Volume II, chapter 9, p. 546 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Newark jail was first broken open to free Samuel Baldwin; four months later Nehemiah Baldwin was rescued, and ‘shortly afterward’ three hundred faced thirty militia at the jail.; The evidence Old Newark’s dates list Nehemiah Baldwin freed both on 19 September 1745 and on 16 January 1746 (Amos Roberts leading the second, which also freed Robert Young and Thomas Sarjeant); the Horseneck histories name Samuel Baldwin in September 1745. The three-hundred-against-thirty standoff appears in no source read but Rothbard.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume II, chapter 10, p. 553 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Worcester Presbyterians’ church was destroyed by the Puritans (no year; placed after the 1718 arrival).; The evidence Lincoln (1837, reported) and a 1972 Worcester newspaper say 1719; Wall, Perry (1890) and the Worcester Historical Museum say 1740. The spec follows 1740.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume II, chapter 14, p. 572 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Moravian Indians, marched to Philadelphia, were “almost lynched by a mob, but protected by a cordon of Quakers,” told after the Conestoga killings of 14 December 1763 and before the Paxton march.; The evidence The Moravians reached Philadelphia in November 1763, before the Conestoga killings. No account read shows a Quaker cordon shielding them on arrival. The Moravian diary (Bethlehem Digital History Project) records cannon mounted in the barracks square on 4 February 1764, 200 armed citizens on the 5th, and on the 6th “Two citizen-companies, including many Quakers carrying arms”; Vaughan counts more than 500 citizen volunteers and 200 royal troops when the Paxton party stopped at Germantown. The Episode paints the armed Quakers at the barracks.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume II, chapter 18, p. 586 · the companion page: Rothbard says Virginia mobilized a strong troop of whites that destroyed the Blue Ridge settlement ‘after a pitched battle’.; The evidence Governor Gooch’s report to the Board of Trade (1729, quoted at slaverebellion.info from VMHB 28, pp. 299-300): the runaways’ owners pursued them with a group of men and they were ‘soon captured in a fight in which one of the slaves was wounded’; Gooch then stepped up militia training. A small fight, not a colonial troop. The VMHB text was not opened.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume II, chapter 19, p. 588 · the companion page: Rothbard says Barnwell lured the Indians to a parley ‘at a spot near New Bern’.; The evidence Baron von Graffenried (quoted at NC Anchor) and Lee 1963 place the seizure at Core Town, where Barnwell had built Fort Barnwell on the Neuse, and call the victims friendly Indians, not specifically Tuscarora.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume II, chapter 22, p. 597 · the companion page: Rothbard says Of the rebels, “ten Negroes managed to escape to freedom.”; The evidence The 1739 account says about thirty escaped the field and that ten of them, having marched about thirty miles south, were overtaken by planters on horseback and, after fighting stoutly, all killed on the spot; it puts the whole action at about forty rebels and twenty whites dead.; Source “An Account of the Negroe Insurrection in South Carolina” (1739), in Candler, Colonial Records of Georgia 22 pt. 2, pp. 232-236
Volume III, chapter 15, p. 830 · the companion page: Rothbard says Captain Richard Smith of the Royal Navy (the St. John affair, 1764).; The evidence battleofrhodeisland.org: “Captain John Smith of the Squirrel”; Wikipedia, ‘HMS Squirrel’, gives Richard.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume III, chapter 18, p. 844 · the companion page: Rothbard says Bute “driven from office” on April 11, 1763 (p. 844); in ch. 4 (p. 794) he resigns at the beginning of April.; The evidence Resignation commonly given as 8 April 1763 (seen only in a search-result title; weak).; Source seen only in a search-result title; weak
Volume III, chapter 21, pp. 864–865 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Virginia Resolves passed “on May 30”, and the old guard struck the fifth “on the next and final day”.; The evidence Henry’s speech and the votes on 29 May 1765, the striking on the 30th (Wikipedia, ‘Virginia Resolves’; Cardinal News, 13 Feb 2024). House Journal not reached.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume III, chapter 34, p. 919 · the companion page: Rothbard says At the New York Liberty Pole in August 1766, “British troops fired into the crowd, wounding several.”; The evidence Soldiers rushed a crowd of two to three thousand on the Common with bayonets and swords, and Isaac Sears was reported hurt. The accounts read record no gunfire.; Source Montresor’s journal and Burrows and Wallace, *Gotham*, both as quoted in secondary summaries (originals not read)
Volume III, chapter 40, p. 943 · the companion page: Rothbard says At St. George’s Fields soldiers killed “five or six” and wounded fifteen.; The evidence Six or seven dead, as many as eleven in contemporary sources (Wikipedia, ‘Massacre of St George’s Fields’).; Source Wikipedia, ‘Massacre of St George’s Fields’
Volume III, chapter 40, p. 943 · the companion page: Rothbard says Riot Act, then stones, then Allen killed, then the general volley.; The evidence Wikipedia has Allen shot first and the Act read after; Past Tense has it read twice.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume III, chapter 49, p. 984 · the companion page: Rothbard says “Judge Elias Desbrosses” led the conservative mob against the nonimportation parade of July 1770.; The evidence Every source read calls Desbrosses a Huguenot merchant, vestryman and founder (later president) of the Chamber of Commerce; none calls him a judge.; Source Chamber of Commerce and Trinity Church histories via search (low-medium confidence)
Volume III, chapter 56, p. 1031 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Sons of Liberty were “disguised as Mohawk Indians.”; The evidence The participants and contemporaries read here describe a crude disguise meant to look like Indians in general. Wyeth wrote of ragged clothes, faces smeared with grease and lamp black or soot, and “dressing to resemble Indians as much as possible”; Hewes blackened his face and hands with coal dust; Andrews wrote of blankets, muffled heads and “copper-colored countenances,” and heard the men called Indians from Narragansett. None of these three names the Mohawk.; Source Wyeth (1827) and Andrews (18 Dec 1773) in Francis S. Drake, Tea Leaves (1884), pp. LXX-LXXI; Hewes in Hawkes (1834), p. 38
Volume III, chapter 71, p. 1110 · the companion page: Rothbard says In mid-August 1773 Allen, Baker and Warner with a hundred Boys demolished Reid’s settlement (“Here is my warrant”; “This is my law!”).; The evidence Smith (1885), ch. III, p. 35, has the Scots colony at New Haven Falls end quietly, the settlers declining to stay; no other source for the warrant scene was found.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 20, p. 1209 · the companion page: Rothbard says General John Thomas “took 2,000 men and 360 carts” to Dorchester Heights on the night of 4 March 1776.; The evidence The NPS gives about 2,000 troops, 360 carts and 800 oxen; Wikipedia gives about 2,500; the American Revolution Podcast has 1,200 under Thomas to build and 800 sentries. Rothbard’s 2,000 is the NPS figure and is followed.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 31, p. 1280 · the companion page: Rothbard says The May 20 mass meeting of nearly five thousand was “whipped up by Paine and others”, with Colonel Roberdeau in the chair.; The evidence Adams’s own letter to James Warren of 20 May 1776 names Colonels McKean, Cadwalader and Matlack as the principal orators and does not mention Paine; it adds that the meeting was in the State House yard in heavy rain, on a stage built on the spot, with Roberdeau reading Congress’s resolve of 15 May and the crowd answering with three cheers and hats flying. Read through the Adams Papers edition’s excerpt; no source seen puts Paine at the meeting.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 35, p. 1304 · the companion page: Rothbard says The fishermen shuttled “the entire force of 9,500 men” across the East River on the night of 29 August 1776.; The evidence Wikipedia (‘Battle of Long Island’) gives 9,000 troops with no loss of life. Rothbard’s figure is the one most often cited for the evacuation; the Episode follows him.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 38, p. 1319 · the companion page: Rothbard says The tenants offered to surrender on May 5; outside militia “headed by landed oligarchs John P. Livingston and Robert Van Rensselaer” were brought in to suppress them, with orders to “fire upon every man fleeing”.; The evidence The New York Almanack (‘The Misnamed Columbia County Battle of Egremont’, from Maj. Esselestyn’s report) and Wikipedia (‘Manor of Livingston Regiment’) date four skirmishes to 2 and 3 May 1777 in the Taghkanic country and name Lt. Col. Stephen Hogeboom and Maj. Richard Esselestyn of the Claverack militia (with Egremont volunteers) as the commanders; neither Livingston nor Van Rensselaer appears there and no surrender on the 5th is mentioned. Rothbard’s source, Lynd’s 1964 article, was not opened, so the 5 May surrender is kept as his.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 39, p. 1324 · the companion page: Rothbard says Baum, “reaching Bennington on August 14”, met Stark’s militia there, and “on the morning of August 16” Stark struck, aided by the shirtsleeved ruse.; The evidence The fight was at Walloomsac, New York, about ten miles from Bennington, on a hill Baum had fortified (the Dragoon Redoubt). The shirtsleeved men with white paper in their hats were Colonel Nichols’s column, taken for Loyalists in the rain at about nine in the morning; Stark’s main assault came about 3 pm on the 16th after the rain cleared. Read through Wikipedia, ‘Battle of Bennington’, the American Battlefield Trust and HistoryNet summaries; the primary reports were not opened.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 42, p. 1343 · the companion page: Rothbard says Washington ‘cursed Lee publicly in a vile manner’.; The evidence Hamilton (‘an awful adjuration’), Lafayette (‘a damned poltroon’) and Scott report swearing, years later (American Heritage, 1965); Tilghman, who was present, and Lee’s own court-martial testimony record a stern demand for ‘the reason for this disorder and confusion’ and the remark that Lee ought not to have undertaken the attack unless he meant to go through with it, and Lee called it ‘very singular expressions’ (Journal of the American Revolution, 2022; American Battlefield Trust).; Source Journal of the American Revolution, 2022; American Battlefield Trust
Volume IV, chapter 49, p. 1397 · the companion page: Rothbard says ‘Led by Sgt. William Bonzar, six full regiments of Pennsylvanians’ mutinied and set out to march on Congress in Philadelphia.; The evidence The name is William Bouzar, who headed the Board of Sergeants at Princeton and spoke to Wayne; the Journal of the American Revolution has John Williams of the 2nd Pennsylvania at its head at Mount Kemble and men of all the regiments at the start, fewer than half the Line at first and about 1,500 of about 2,400 in the end. The men went to Princeton first.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 50, p. 1400 · the companion page: Rothbard says Rodney seized ‘nearly 50 Dutch ships’.; The evidence Wikipedia (‘Capture of Sint Eustatius’) has about 130 merchantmen in the bay and a convoy captured at Sombrero; More Than Nelson has 150 merchant ships.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 53, p. 1422 · the companion page: Rothbard says ‘Fewer than 300 South Carolina militia’ routed Boyd’s Tories, with ‘nearly 200 other casualties’ and about 30 on the patriot side.; The evidence The New Georgia Encyclopedia and Wikipedia have about 340 to 420 militia from South Carolina and Georgia under Pickens, Dooly and Clarke against 600 to 800 Loyalists; the Encyclopedia counts 20 Loyalists dead and 22 taken on the field and seven patriots killed and fifteen wounded.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 55, p. 1431 · the companion page: Rothbard says Captain ‘Houk’ camped ‘northwest of Williamson’s plantation’ with 400 Tory militia, and 260 rebels under Bratton killed him and caused almost 90 casualties for one rebel killed.; The evidence The captain is Christian Huck, with about 115 men (Legion dragoons, New York Volunteers and Loyalist militia), camped in the field round James Williamson’s house; Wikipedia and Carolana have about 150 to 250 rebels under Colonel Andrew Neel, with Bratton, Lacey and Hill under him; Carolana has 25 to 50 Loyalists killed.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 60, p. 1449 · the companion page: Rothbard says The rout of Pyle’s Tories at Haw River was on 23 February 1781, and Pickens and Lee ‘duped, surprised, and virtually massacred’ 400 mounted recruits.; The evidence The North Carolina marker G-22 and Emerging Revolutionary War say 25 February, Wikipedia 24 February; the marker has about 300 Loyalists. Lee’s Memoirs (as quoted by those sources) explain the ‘duping’: Lee’s green-jacketed Legion was taken for Tarleton’s. The spec follows 25 February.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume IV, chapter 78, p. 1551 · the companion page: Rothbard says 300 ex-slaves stayed in the swamps at Bear Creek when the British evacuated Savannah (1782), and it took four years and the combined Georgia and South Carolina militia to rout them.; The evidence Sources quoting Diouf (Push Black, Wikipedia ‘Maroons’, the South Carolina Encyclopedia, as seen in summaries) place the Savannah River maroon camps in 1786-87: the Belleisle camps burned by militia in 1787, then Bear Creek, whose walled fortress militia found on 21 April 1787 and forced and burned in May. One summary puts the community at about 100, not 300. Rothbard’s four years run from 1782 to 1786, which the accounts read do not match.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume V, chapter 4, p. 70 · the companion page: Rothbard says Ely was arrested ‘in mid-May’ for his leadership in the Northampton riots (the mobs of 4 and 12 April), convicted and jailed at Springfield, and freed by 120 men on 13 June.; The evidence The Massachusetts Historical Society’s Adams Papers note (PJA 13, p. 195) has Ely found guilty of ‘seditious and disorderly behaviour’ at Springfield in April 1782, and search summaries of other accounts have him arrested at the Northampton courthouse on 12 April and rescued on 12 or 13 June (110 to 130 men). The sequence of arrest, trial and jailing is not settled by the pages read, none of which was a primary record. The spec paints only Ely’s address before the court and gives the later events as Rothbard has them.; Source the sources named in the evidence column
Volume V, chapter 25, p. 221 · the companion page: Rothbard says The Assembly called the convention elections for ‘November 2’.; The evidence The Assembly’s resolution of 29 September set the first Tuesday in November, which fell on 6 November 1787; CSAC and the Teaching American History timelines give 6 November (read through search summaries). Rothbard’s text gives the convention’s opening as 21 November, which agrees with the sources that say it opened with a quorum on the 21st; others give 20 November.; Source the sources named in the evidence column