The American Revolution and the Boer War, An Open Letter to Mr. Charles Francis Adams on His Pamphlet "The Confederacy and the Transvaal" — Inside the Classic

Adams's Argument and Fisher's Counterpoint

Fisher opens by summarizing Adams's position: that the Boers ought to have stopped fighting after their regular forces were beaten, because a guerrilla war is destructive to both sides. Adams cites General Lee's surrender at Appomattox as a model of honorable cessation. Fisher immediately counters that this doctrine—that a hopeless struggle should not be prolonged beyond 'scientific defeat'—would have invalidated the American Revolution itself. He quotes Adams's own words: 'the contest drags wearily along, to the probable destruction of one of the combatants.' Fisher then invokes John Adams, whom he calls 'your very unwise and altogether reckless great grandfather,' to label such a dependent position as 'political slavery.'

Washington, Duché, and the Question of Surrender

Fisher recounts an episode from 1777 when Reverend Jacob Duché wrote to George Washington urging him to negotiate a settlement short of independence. Duché argued that Washington alone could stop the war and that England would never grant independence. Washington rejected the appeal, sending Duché's letter to Congress and to Francis Hopkinson, Duché's brother-in-law. Fisher quotes Hopkinson's stinging reply: 'the whole force of the reasoning contained in your letter tends to this point: that virtue and honor require us to stand by truth, as long as it can be done with safety, but that her cause may be abandoned on the approach of danger.' Fisher asserts that this principle—that justice should not be measured by success—is the foundation of the United States and of many other nations.

Franklin's Pragmatism and the Broader Principle

Fisher turns to Benjamin Franklin, describing him as 'not what is called an enthusiast or fanatic' but 'one of the shrewd calculating kind.' Franklin, who had full knowledge of conditions from his years in England, nevertheless persisted in the revolutionary cause. Fisher uses this to argue that the right to struggle for independence is 'the most fundamental and necessary, the most powerful and far reaching, the most scientific and well settled principle of moral conduct that history has disclosed.' He extends the argument to other peoples: the Irish, the Armenians, the Poles, and the South American republics. The letter insists that denying this right denies the validity of the United States itself.

Readers should note that this text is a polemic, not a balanced history. Fisher selects only those Revolutionary episodes that support his case, and he does not address the complexities of the Boer War itself. The letter's value lies in its clear articulation of a principle—the moral right to fight on against overwhelming odds—and in its demonstration of how historical analogies were deployed in early twentieth-century political debate.

That rainy afternoon, I kept returning to Fisher’s insistence that desperate resistance deserves honor, not scorn. It made me think of ordinary men enduring the same grim logic. Later, almost by accident, I found The Third Massachusetts Regiment Volunteer Militia in the War of the Rebellion, 1861-1863 — A Reader’s Guide, and the difference between grand philosophy and muddy boots felt suddenly, quietly profound.