Conference Program 2025
55th Annual Conference of the Consortium
on the Revolutionary Era, 1750-1850
Auburn University
Columbus State University’s Hallock Endowment for Military History
February 27 – March 1, 2025
Dixon Conference Center
Auburn, Alabama
Thursday, February 27
Registration | 4:00 – 6:00 pm
Welcome Reception with Quintet Performance | 5:30 – 6:30 PM
Dinner and Opening Keynote Address | 6:30 PM
Lynn Hunt, University of California, Los Angeles
“The Revolutionary Self”
Location: Legacy Ballroom & Annex
Friday, February 28
8:00 AM: Coffee, Tea, and Snacks
Location: Foyer
Session 1 | 8:30 - 10:15 am
4 panels
Panel 1A: Petitioning on the Periphery of the British Atlantic
Location: Azalea
Chair & Commentator: Elijah Gaddis, Auburn University
Nathaniel Conley, University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, “’We need all the Negroes we can get’: The Slave Trade and War in Charleston’s Atlantic World, 1754-1763”
James R. Fichter, University of Hong Kong, “Trading Bonds: Debt, Revolution, and Empire in the South Carolina Slave Trade”
Eileen McDonagh, Northeastern University, “How Revolutions Can Derail Democratic Political Development: The American Case”
Panel 1B: Rascals and Renegades of the Revolutionary Era
Location: Longleaf
Chair & Commentator: Ben Bascom, Bell State University
Vaughn Scribner, University of Central Arkansas, "A Real 'Pickle': Lord Timothy Dexter's Revolutionary, Rapacious Rise and Fall"
Timothy Hemmis, Texas A&M University-Central Texas, "Caught in a Revolutionary Web: Captain Thomas Hutchins in London and Paris during the War for Independence 1776-1781"
Alex Beringer, University of Montevallo, The “Doodle” and Nationalism in Early U.S. Comic Art
Panel 1C: 10 Years of www.AgeofRevolutions.com : A Roundtable
Location: Oak Room I
Participants:
Bryan A. Banks, Columbus State University
Cindy Ermus, University of Nebraska
Zachary Stoltzfus, Florida State University
Rob Taber, Fayetteville State University
Panel 1D: The Living and the Dead
Location: Oak Room II
Chair & Commentator: Christopher Ferguson, Auburn University
Carol Harrison, University of South Carolina, "The Afterlives of a Princess: Saints and Ghosts in Restoration Rome"
Carolyn Anne Day, Furman University, “The Cordon Bleu of Physicians”: Medical Conflict, Agency, and the Illness of Princess Amelia”
Jason Eden, Wayne State College, “Aging is a Grave Matter: What Stone Memorials Reveal about Chronological Age in Revolutionary North America”
10:15 - 10:30 AM: Coffee, Tea, and Snacks
Location: Foyer
Session 2 | 10:30 am - 12:15 pm
4 panels
Panel 2A: Reactions and Reforms in the Spanish Empire, 1750-1815
Location: Longleaf
Chair & Commentator: Philip Baltuskonis, Auburn University
Marco Cabrera Geserick, Northern Arizona University, “Napoleon in the Tropics: Reception and Reaction to the Napoleonic Wars on the edge of the Spanish Empire”
Daniel Arenas, Florida State University, “A Civil War Made Global: Fernandismo, Bayonismo, and the Future of the Spanish Empire”
Phillip D. Fox, Wayne State College, “Enlightened Reform of Ecclesiastical Privileges in the Spanish Empire: The Concordat of 1753 and its Legacy”
Panel 2B: Roundtable - Menacing Tides: Security, Piracy and Empire in the Nineteenth-Century Mediterranean
Location: Oak Room I
Chair: Beatrice de Graaf, Utrecht University
Panelists:
Christine Haynes, University of North Carolina, Charlotte
Erik de Lange, Utrecht University
Christopher Mapes, Independent Scholar
Alexander Mikaberidze, Louisiana State University Shreveport
Brian Vick, Emory University
Evan Wilson, US Naval War College
Panel 2C: George Eliot in the Digital Age: New Tools and Resources for Analyzing Her Writing
Location: Oak Room II
Chair: Beverley Rilett, Auburn University
Sarah Guyer, Auburn University, Cataloging George Eliot’s Reading
Alexis Stoffers, Auburn University, Improving Accessibility with Alt-Text
Kaylen Michaelis, Auburn University, AI-Assisted Summaries: Approaches and Applications
Panel 2D: American Identity, Memorialization, and Memory in the Early Republic, 1776-1812
Location: Azalea
Chair & Commentator: Sam Cavell, Southeastern Louisiana University
Nicholas Scamardo, Southeastern Louisiana University, "The Cause of All Mankind: Thomas Paine’s Vision of American Identity and Global Justice"
Kelsa Pellettiere, University of Mississippi, “‘Food for Worms’: Remembering Benjamin Franklin After the American Revolution”
Colin Mathison, University of Mississippi, “Being ‘American’ in the Age of Revolutions”
Friday Luncheon with Keynote Speaker | 12:30 - 2:15 pm
Keynote: Sarah Chambers, University of Minnesota
“The Dispirit of 1825: Spanish Loyalists in a Shrinking Empire”
Location: Legacy Ballroom & Annex
Session 3 | 2:30 - 4:15 pm
4 panels
Panel 3A: Crafting Imperial Borders
Location: Oak Room I
Chair: Ralph Kingston, Auburn University
Commentator: Carol Harrison, University of South Carolina
William Oaks, Florida State University, “Courting Counts: Legal Cultures and Border Formation in Eighteenth Century Strasbourg”
David Ellis, Augustana College, “The Cologne ‘Mixed-Marriage Controversy’ of the 1830s and Joseph Görres’ Response in Athanasius”
Marissa Gavin, University of California – Irvine, “Early Nineteenth Century French Imperial Formation in the South Pacific”
Panel 3B: The Production and Uses of Military History in the Revolutionary Era
Location: Oak Room II
Chair: Mark Gerges, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College
Commentator: Alexander Mikaberidze, Louisiana State University Shreveport
Peter Hicks, Fondation Napoleon, “Anthony Emmett, of the Royal Engineers: A Liberal Gentleman Military Historian of the British Empire”
Rafe Blaufarb, Florida State University, “The First History of Revolutionary Military Legislation: Napoleon's "Code Militaire"
Michael Bonura, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, “The Biographers of Napoleon: Antoine-Henri Jomini, Sir Walter Scott, and the Life of Napoleon”
Panel 3C: Resistance among the Living and Dead in the 18th Century Caribbean
Location: Longleaf
Chair: Sarah Chambers, University of Minnesota
Commentator: Dean Kostantaras, University of Houston-Downtown
Katie Truax, University of Houston & Lone Star College University Park, “Edward Long’s Medical Epistemology and Conceptions of Death in 18th Century Jamaica”
Daniel Killian, University of Houston, “Forest Meetings Post and Prior 1791: Maroon Forces and the Struggle for San Domingue”
Muthuvel Deivendran, University of Houston, “Resistance in a Small Place: Re-Imagining the Slavery resistance in the Lesser Antilles”
4:15 - 4:30 PM: Coffee, Tea, and Snacks
Location: Foyer
Session 4 | 4:30 - 6:15 pm
4 panels
Panel 4A: How to Teach "Napoleonic Warfare" in the 21st Century
Location: Oak Room I
Chair & Commentator: Harold D. Blanton, US Naval War College
Michael Jones, US Naval War College, “Teaching Napoleonic Strategies for the Modern Officer, or How to Defeat the Master of Decisive Battle”
Donald Stoker, National Defense University, “Using Clausewitz’s Ideas to Teach Strategy”
Llewellyn Cook, Jacksonville State University, “‘American Military History’ classes to Undergraduates”
Panel 4B: Stereotypes and Conspiracy Theories across the Revolutionary Rupture: Eighteenth to Nineteenth Centuries
Location: Oak Room II
Chair: Denise Davidson, Georgia State University
Commentator: Beatrice de Graaf, Utrecht University
Jeffrey Burson, Georgia Southern University, “Unbelievers & Atheists: From Early Modern Rehabilitation to Counterrevolutionary Villains”
Kenneth Loiselle, Trinity University, “Freemasons and Conspiracy Theories during the French Revolution”
Glauco Schettini, Haverford College, “The French Revolution as a Jewish Conspiracy: The Origins of an Anti-Semitic Canard”
Panel 4C: Tensions and Rebellions in the Revolutionary Atlantic World
Location: Longleaf
Chair & Commentator: Robert Taber, Fayetteville State University
Sarah Donovan, William & Mary, “’The sweets of an Indian trade’: Authority, Violence, and the Construction of Indian Policy on the Mid-Atlantic Frontier, 1754-1768”
Charles Cox, Texas Christian University, “From Seville to New Orleans: The Life and Journey of Antonio de Ulloa”
Kate Kaitcer, Texas Christian University, “Tensions of Travel: Janet Schaw’s Journey through the British Colonies”
Panel 4D: A Reappraisal of Campaigns and Commanders
Chair & Commentator: Alexander Mikaberidze, Louisiana State University Shreveport
John Maass, National Museum of the United States Army, “From Trenton to Yorktown: Turning Points of the American Revolutionary War, 1775-83”
Vanya Eftimova Bellinger, US Naval War College, “The Wallmoden Corps in the Fall Campaign of 1813: The Challenges of Secondary Theater in Napoleonic Wars”
Nicholas Kramer, University of North Texas, "Prince Karl zu Schwarzenberg and the art of Coalition Warfare, 1813-1814"
Friday Evening
Enjoy Auburn-Opelika restaurants; see suggested recommendations in your welcome folder.
Saturday, March 1
8:00 AM: Coffee, Tea, and Snacks
Location: Foyer
Session 5 | 8:30 - 10:15 am
4 panels
Panel 5A: Decline, Fall and Collapse after Napoleon: European Anxieties over Reconstructing Empire and Civilization
Location: Oak Room I
Chair: Suzanne Marchand, Louisiana State University
Commentator: Beatrice de Graaf, Utrecht University
Erik de Lange, Utrecht University, “Unhallowed Doctrines: The Law of Nations and Imperial Anxiety at the British Admiralty”
Stefano Lissi, Utrecht University, “How Ideas of ‘national decline’ influenced nationalist movements in Italy and Germany after 1815”
Christopher Mapes, Independent Scholar, “Decline of the Reich: Central Europeans read Edward Gibbon”
Panel 5B: Illicit Activities on the High Seas
Location: Longleaf
Chair & Commentator: Christine Haynes, University of North Carolina, Charlotte
Holly Vlach, Auburn University, “On These Rocky Shores: Women and Piracy in Colonial New England, 1690-1750”
Erik Braeden Lewis, Doña Ana Community College, “Cooks, Domestics, and Wetnurses: Émigrés and Human Trafficking during the French Revolution”
Sydney Watts, University of Richmond, “The Loyalties of Channel Island Interlopers: Jersey’s Chamber of Commerce, Guernsey’s Brandy Smugglers, and Anglo-French Trade Relations during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars”
Panel 5C: Roundtable Discussion with Author – Serpent in Eden: Foreign Meddling and Partisan Politics in James Madison’s America
Location: Oak Room II
Chair: Alexander Mikaberidze, Louisiana State University Shreveport
Panelists:
Tyson Reeder, Brigham Young University
Timothy C. Hemmis, Texas A&M University-Central Texas
Armin Mattes, University of Virginia
Rosemarie Zagarri, Yale University
Panel 5D: Diplomacy in the Age of Revolutions
Location: Azalea
Chair: Rafe Blaufarb, Florida State University
Commentator: Wayne Hanley, West Chester University
Don Hickey, Wayne State College (ret.), “The Jay Treaty: A Reappraisal”
Ethan Soefje, University of North Texas, “Between the Bear and the Eagles: Prussian Neutrality as Strategy 1797-1806”
10:15 - 10:30 AM: Coffee, Tea, and Snacks
Location: Foyer
Session 6 | 10:30 am - 12:15 pm
3 panels
Panel 6A: Contesting Status: Emancipation, Equality, and Citizenship
Location: Oak Room I
Chair: Denise Davidson, Georgia State University
Commentator: Sarah Chambers, University of Minnesota
Christopher M Florio, Hollins University, “Slave Emancipation in the Shadow of Poverty: A Story of Gradual Abolition in Early America”
Devin J Vartija, Utrecht University, “An Insatiable Passion for Equality: Transforming an Idea into a Feeling in the French Revolutionary Era”
Elyssa Gage, Wilkes University, “’Are You Not a Man of Color?’ Citizenship and Race Claims in the Case of Louis-Antoine Blanchet against Haitian President Boyer, 1826-1827”
Panel 6B: Commodities, Material Culture, and Trade
Location: Oak Room II
Chair & Commentator: Luke Reynolds, University of Connecticut-Stamford
Zachary Stoltzfus, Florida State University, “Sugar, Silk, and Soap: The Continental System and the Domestic Production of Luxury Goods in the First Empire”
Patrick Callaway, University of Maine, “American Independence as a Supply Chain Crisis: Provisions and the Case of Nova Scotia 1783-94”
Kimberly Nath, University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, “Everyday Objects: The American Revolution at Home through Goods”
Panel 6C: Making a Career in Public History
Location: Mell 3550 (See map in your welcome folder)
Chair: Greg Schmidt, Special Collections and Archives, Auburn University
Presenters:
Bryan Banks, Columbus State University
Lyn Causey, National Park Service
Alex Colvin, Alabama Department of Archives and History
John Maass, National Museum of the United States Army
Followed by sandwiches and cookies in Mell 3550
Lunch (On Your Own): 12:30 - 2:00 pm
See list of local restaurants in the welcome pack
CRE Board of Directors Lunch: 12:30 - 2:00 pm
Location: Camellia
Session 7 | 2:30 - 4:15 pm
4 panels
Panel 7A: International Ties to Revolution
Location: Azalea
Chair & Commentator: Dean Kostantaras, University of Houston-Downtown
Enrico Magnani, United Nations Secretariat, “Liberators. The real reasons of international action during Greek Independence War”
Armin Langer, University of Florida, “Alexander Zuntz: A Hessian Supplier’s Role in the Revolutionary War and Post-War New York Jewish Leadership”
Aggelis Zarokostas, Utrecht University, “Between archaeology, travel-writing and espionage: the case of William Martin Leake and the British intelligence community in Greece”
Panel 7B: The Politics of Learning and Education in North America and Revolutionary France
Location: Oak Room II
Chair & Commentator: Marc Lerner, University of Mississippi
Zachary Deibel, Virginia Military Institute, “The Imperial Educational Crisis: Learning and Politics in Colonial New York, 1763 to 1775”
Kristine Wirts, University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley, “Enlightenment Pedagogies and Real Practices: The Case of the Charity School of Lausanne”
James Lavelle, Binghamton University, SUNY, “Ensconcing Republicanism After the Terror: A Statistical Re-Evaluation of the Directory’s Central Schools”
Panel 7C: Memory and Narratives of Revolutions and Revolutionaries
Location: Longleaf
Chair & Commentator: Bryan Banks, Columbus State University
Francesca Langer, University of Central Missouri, "Self-Taught Heroes: Indian Answers to Creole Classicism"
James Bland, University of Oklahoma, “Don, But Not Forgotten: The California Missions as the Lost Cause of the Wild West?”
Peter Hicks, Fondation Napoléon, “Was Napoleon in fact the author of the influential ‘Manuscript transmitted from St Helena by an unknown channel’? New evidence in favour.”
Betje Klier, University of Texas at Austin, “"From the Alps to Alabama, Marengo and General Lefebvre-Desnouettes leave their mark"
Panel 7D: Britain’s Quest for World Power in the Napoleonic Wars
Location: Oak Room II
Chair & Commentator: Kenneth Johnson, Air Command and Staff College
Evan Wilson, U.S. Naval War College, “Maritime Culture and the Fiscal-Naval State”
Sam Cavell, Southeastern Louisiana University, “’The Nearest Run Thing’: Resourcing Crises and Britian’s Struggle to Survive in the Napoleonic Wars”
Kevin D. McCranie, U.S. Naval War College, “Balancing Time and Space with Inadequate Force: Deploying the British Navy, 1793-1815”
4:15 - 4:30 PM: Coffee, Tea, and Snacks
Location: Foyer
Session 8 | 4:30 - 6:15 pm
4 panels
Panel 8A: Politics and Language of the French Revolution
Location: Oak Room I
Chair & Commentator: Lauren Clay, Vanderbilt University
Claudio Man, University of North Texas, “Opening Public Employment to Talent and Virtue: Article VI of the Declaration of the Rights of Men and Citizen: A Matter of Interpretation?”
Jerry Biggerstaff, Florida State University, “The Meanings of National Sovereignty: The Nation in the French Pamphlet Debates, 1770-1789”
Maria Betlem Castellà I Pujols, Pompeu Fabra University, “In search of a method to locate the political tendency of the deputies of the National Constituent Assembly (1789-1791)”
Panel 8B: Individuals Negotiating the Politics of Revolutions
Location: Longleaf
Chair & Commentator: Vaughn Scribner, University of Central Arkansas
Kevin Murphy, Stony Brook University, “Loyalty Oaths and the Crisis of the American Revolution”
Emilee N. K. Robbins, University of North Carolina, Greensboro, “The Memoirs of Mrs. Coghlan: Loyalism, Motherhood, and Survival after the American Revolution”
Madison Guth, University of North Alabama, “The Life and Influences of Conventionnel Louis-Antoine Saint-Just: Rural Politician and Poet to Future Revolutionary”
Panel 8C: Art, Archaeology, and Aesthetic Politics in the German Cultural Realm
Location: Azalea
Chair & Commentator: Brian Vick, Emory University
Matthew Feminella, University of Alabama, “De-Schillering Beauty: The Kalliasbriefe as Correspondence”
Suzanne Marchand, Louisiana State University, “Archaeology, c. 1830: Why All Roads Still Ran Through Rome”
George Williamson, Florida State University, “’Männer der Erhebung’”: Arndt, Gneisenau, and the Memory of the German Uprising in the Stefan George Circle”
Panel 8D: International Depictions of Revolution, 1789 – 1848
Location: Oak Room II
Chair & Commentator: Ralph Kingston, Auburn University
Numan Deniz, Binghamton University, SUNY, “Ottoman Observers of Revolutionary France and the Napoleonic Empire: Two Ambassadors during the Directory, Consulate, and Empire”
Simos Zenios, Stony Brook University, “Transfers of Violence: The Cultural Politics of Revolution in the Eastern Mediterranean”
Tyler Cline, University of Florida, “A restive, radical, discontented people, at war with all government”: The Know-Nothings, Nativism, and the Anti-Radical Response to the Revolutions of 1848”
Saturday Evening
Reception | 6:30 - 7:00 pm
Banquet with Keynote Address | 7:00 - 9:00 pm
Keynote Speaker: Beatrice de Graaf, Utrecht University
“Zombies, Czars and the Ghosts of the Past: Reclaiming the 19th Century”
Location: Legacy Ballroom