Clarke describes events in Nova Scotia leading up to the siege of Fort Cumberland by the Continental army in 1776 and argues that from the beginning of hostilities Nova Scotians' primary loyalty was to Britain. He examines the attitudes of the various players in the region - New England planters, Acadians, Native peoples, Yorkshiremen, and Scots-Irish - and their responses to the call to arms issued by the revolutionary forces in the thirteen colonies. Clarke is the first to take the Nova Scotia patriots seriously and explain their motives instead of damning them as rebels. An in-depth study of a British colony's reaction to and ultimate rejection of independence, The Siege of Fort Cumberland will be of great interest to colonial historians in Canada and the United States.

Ernest Clarke's profile page

"A tour de force ... By skilfully exploiting a wealth of new detail on the Cumberland siege relative to the whole colony in the 1770s, Clarke's narrative makes an important and impressive contribution to knowledge. Above everything else it is the penetrating detail that makes this study so remarkable." David Bell, Law, University of New Brunswick.