What the name of the historian who wrote a book downsizing the use of guns during the revolutionary war?

Question

I remember a few years back there was somewhat of a controversy involving a historian who wrote a book which claimed the guns weren't very important during the revolutionary war but I can't remember who it was. What was the name of the historian and his book?

Answer 1

I'm sure that CanProf is correct, as last week, for July 4, History Channel had a documentary (docudrama?) about the American Revolution, and the British Army at the time had a new weapon called the bayonet,  that was the main weapon of the Redcoats.

This was a terrifying new technology, because musketeers used to line up ~100 meters or yards apart and shoot, but with the bayonet, they would now close to fight.  The bayonet of the late 18th century was specifically designed to puncture the abdomen, and then pull the victim's intestines out.  What a horrible death!

Answer 2

"Arming America" was once a prize-winning book subsequently revealed to be fraudulent due to the author's having invented some of the book's historical data and his having willfully misrepresented other data.

The author was fired by Emory University for his misconduct, the prizes awarded the author were rescinded, and the publisher withdrew the book from circulation.

http://hnn.us/articles/691.html

Answer 3

Michael Bellesiles

Arming America: The Origins of a National Gun Culture (New York: Knopf, 2000). Permission of Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.

Answer 4

I'm not familiar with precisely that argument.  I recall that in 1990 John Shy wrote "A People Numerous and Armed" which, among other things, asserted that the militia was less important and less useful than the national mythos suggested they were.  

On more general grounds,one could argue that firearms were only a piece of the military arsenal important during the revolution.  Some few Colonial units marched into battle, early on, with pikes and swords instead of firearms.  And of course, firing a musket was often an exercise in futility unless a large mass of men was doing so at the same time.  Moreover, the British and Hessian forces were, after all, masters of the bayonet, and there were certainly several major military actions in which the soldiers of one side or another were ordered not to load their muskets, and rely upon the bayonet instead.  Many of the most important early victories of the British forces over the American came duer to the British ability to perform a bayonet charge, and the American lack of equipment and training with which to counter such a move.  It is very significant that at Monmouth, in the aftermath of the Valeey Forge winter, the Americans were equipped and trained to stand up to the British with bayonets, and that the British were somewhat astonished at this capacity.

Sorry I can't be of more help.  I've read a good deal on the War of Independence, but I must have somehow missed the book you're writing about.