On this day 250 years ago from London Benjamin Franklin wrote his friend and ally Joseph Galloway, Speaker of the Pennsylvania Assembly an optimistic assessment of the future of America after the coming war with Britain concluded:
I must soon quit the scene, but you may live to see our country flourish; as it will amazingly and rapidly after the war is over; like a field of young Indian corn, which long fair weather and sunshine had enfeebled and discolored, and which in that weak state, by a sudden gust of violent wind, hail, and rain, seemed to be threatened with absolute destruction; yet the storm being past, it recovers fresh verdure, shoots up with double vigor, and delights the eye not of its owners only, but of every observing traveler.
Ironically, Galloway would not participate in the optimistic future for America predicted by Franklin. After serving in the First Continental Congress, Galloway became one of the leading Loyalists opposing Independence and supporting British forces in the Revolutionary War. Fleeing to Britain at the end of the War, Galloway never returned to America.
Source: https://www.americanhistorycentral.com/entries/benjamin-franklin-quotes/
On This Day In The Revolution 
One response to “On this day 250 years ago in the Revolution — February 18, 1774”
I think we should perhaps not judge all the loyalists (like Galloway) too harshly. There must have been those who wanted to support their neighbors but weren’t willing to sacrifice everything they had striven to justly achieve. For them, it must have been a difficult choice during these initial days of the rebellion.
When Luther rebelled against the church in 1517, he said his goal had not been to form new but to reform the old. The American patriots had done the same in the 1770s in their bid for justice until all hope of reform was lost. I wonder how many friendly loyalists they garnered during these early efforts?
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