If the Americans lose the Revolution where do they go?

Skallagrim

Banned
I'm talking about the OTL Revolution. You never saw colonial assemblies reinstated in the southern colonies, you saw British officers joking "lol our troops are as nubile and riotous as satyrs" as they raped Americans (including in loyalist territories!).

As sad as it is, such behaviour during war has historically been rather common. Nor would it make sense to restore colonial assemblies during a crisis which - at least from the British perspective - was instigated by the members of those assemblies in the first place. And that's a crucial bit: during this crisis. It does not reflect what may or may not have happened as a resolution to that crisis became possible. As gruesome as the behaviour of soldiers towards the populace was, we have seen examples og how they treated men of standing: with respect. The example of Lee was raised. During the war, British officers stayed at the home of Thomas Jefferson, the man who wrote the Declaration... and molested nothing there. During British offensives in the south, lots of 'gentlemen' were treated with respect. British offices dined at their homes. As horrible as it is, given the timeframe... "commoners" get raped and murdered by the dozens. "Gentlemen" get treated with respect.

I think that rather indicates that if the right resolution to the American crisis can be found, many if not all prominent leaders of the revolution can get away with nary a scratch on them. (If the resolution of the crisis goes in another direction, it may also end in the lot of them being executed, but I'm not at all convinced that's somehow a given.)
 
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The Americans wanted "No taxation without representation". The actual deal they had been getting till French and Indian War had been "no representation but low taxes". And that was a deal Spain had also been offering to their settlers till the military threats forced them to increase taxation with no representation.

No, they had representation and taxation. They had their own assemblies that they used to tax themselves (albeit, lightly). That was what they wanted to have continue.

People need to stop this right now and remember this is a forum about real, actual history, not snark about 'lol this silly tax dodging colonists!'.

and a lot of the time it was 'no representation and no taxes'. The colonies were notorious for poor tax collection. IIRC, one of the Founding Fathers was a tax assessor who was being called to account for his missing revenue. Plus, the colonists were superb smugglers, and managed to avoid customs on a lot of imports...

Of course, the British Isles in this period were also filled with superb smugglers. That was the way things worked in the 18th century, modern ideas of an all-encompassing state whsoe laws are followed most of the time aren't 100% applicable. Back then, the mountains were high and the Emperor was far away.

Gustav III could buy St Barth a bit ahead of schedule and settle them there.

Sweden would be an interesting choice for them, considering this was within only a few years of Gustav's coup against the Riksdag.
 
Really, regardless of the political situation, the migration patterns are going to remain virtually unchanged. There was very little any central government, be it the United States or the British Empire, could do to stop American settlers from expanding to the rest of the continent.
 
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