William Shirley Governor Of Massachusetts 1741 1756 A History Volume I PDF Download

Excerpt from William Shirley, Vol. 1: Governor of Massachusetts, 1741-1756; A History Paradoxically, Governor William Shirley has enjoyed the reputation of something approximating if not actually exemplifying greatness, while the history of his time has been regarded as one of monotony and heaviness relieved by occasional dramatic incidents which stood out in higher relief because of the obscurity in which a gray twilight has enveloped their background. The judgment has been generally expressed that the period of colonial history within which Shirley's career falls, that lying between the English Revolution and the events just before the American Revolution, is without great intrinsic significance. Recently, however, a considerable number of monographs have been written dealing with matters falling within this period and the time is perhaps approaching when the darkness in which it has been shrouded will be dissipated. Meanwhile the writer ventures the judgment that it is not a gulf separating significant periods of history, not a no man's land in which the historical student is likely to happen upon disaster, but a field whose essential significance is likely to receive an increased recognition with the passage of time. Without intensive study of it a proper evaluation cannot be made of the merits of the imperial policies of England under the house of Orange and the early Hanoverians nor of the reactions of the colonists to those policies which ultimately led to the American Revolution. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.