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Empire Ablaze
The American Revolution and the Atlantic Working Class
Brief Description
Empire Ablaze tells the story of James Aitken—housepainter, highwayman, and escaped indentured servant—as he wandered the colonies on the eve of the American Revolution, and his dramatic mission to cripple the British navy by destroying Portsmouth dockyard and Bristol harbour. In the process, it explores how...
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See moreIn 1776, Britain is at war with American rebels. One man sets out to bring the empire down from within.
In 1776, Britain is at war with American rebels. One man sets out to bring the empire down from within.
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Description
Empire Ablaze tells the story of James Aitken—housepainter, highwayman, and escaped indentured servant—as he wandered the colonies on the eve of the American Revolution, and his dramatic mission to cripple the British navy by destroying Portsmouth dockyard and Bristol harbour.
In the process, it explores how an emerging transatlantic working class experienced the transformation and crisis of Britain’s eighteenth-century empire, and how enlightenment philosophy turned into popular ideas about the rights of ordinary people and the corruption of imperial authorities.
Reframing the American Revolution as a British civil war, Empire Ablaze offers a fresh account of the United States’ birth and the origins of radical politics in Britain, finding insights for the revolutionary struggles of our own crisis-ridden times.
Book Details
INFORMATION
ISBN: 9781836741459
Publisher: Verso Books
Format: Hardback
Date Published: 21 July 2026
Country: United Kingdom
Imprint: Verso Books
Audience: General / adult
DIMENSIONS
Spine width: 16.0mm
Width: 140.0mm
Height: 210.0mm
Weight: 271g
Pages: 176
About the Author
Tom Cutterham is an associate professor of United States history at the University of Birmingham, and the author of Gentlemen Revolutionaries: Power and Justice in the New American Republic. He has written for Jacobin, the Nation, and the New Republic, as well as a handful of scholarly journals.
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