As I wrap up my historiography, I find myself staring down the barrel of the next task: the actual 404 paper. Fortunately, my historiography has served well it’s dual purpose of revealing holes in the research. As of now, it seems that there are two possible directions I could go.
If you read my last post, the work on Edmund Andros generally goes one of two directions: it is a broad view of British colonies in America with a negative view on Andros, or it is a much more focused work which holds Andros in a more positive light. This leaves two gaping holes which could be easily filled, buttressed by the existing literature.
Option 1
There is a lack of work on the Glorious Revolution in America portraying Andros in a positive light. I think that this is not only very possible to do, but somewhat surprising. My concern is that it runs the risk of coming across very Anglo-centric. There must be a reason for the Revolution to have spread to America, and certainly missteps by Andros seem to have played a role; given this, accounting for these mistakes while emphasizing the apparently rabble-rousing, malcontent tendencies of many colonists could end up sounding much more Anglo-centric than I’d like. Of course, it remains an excellent option as long as I’m careful; Mary Lou Lustig’s “revisionist” biography is evidence enough that Andros is not impossible to paint in a positive light. The questions is just transposing that to a larger stage.
Option 2
My other option seems to be exactly the opposite. Given that only biography on Andros is a “revisionist” history, this means there is a dearth of “traditional” biographical work on him. An investigation of Andros and his decisions and the climate in which those decisions were made which concludes that Andros was not a good administrator, and made many wrong decisions would, surprisingly, be quite unique. Even the articles that look at Andros closely treat him fairly favorably. Again, the concern here is fairness. The works discussing Andros through broader lenses seem to indicate that he certainly did have problems, but the narrower lens and shorter paper length would force me, as the author, to select a no more than a few specific events and investigate them looking for poor decision making without resorting to counterfactuals or relying on a presentist or forward-looking approach.
Both options present unique challenges, but could certainly be effective if well executed. If you have any ideas or opinions on these options, or other possible options, feel free to leave them here. Hopefully I’ll be able to sort out which direction to go in the next few days as I delve more deeply into the primary sources.
TvA