History

Apr 2, 2022 - Union University Phi Alpha Theta student members Anne Adams and Nicholas Terra presented papers virtually at the Arkansas Phi Alpha Theta Regional Conference at Harding University on April 2, 2022. They were part of a panel titled “Politics, War, and Immigration.” Dr. Stephen Carls, the faculty advisor to Union’s Delta-Psi chapter of Phi Alpha Theta, also participated in the conference virtually.

The paper that Adams delivered was titled “A ‘Sincere and Informal’ Relationship: Twentieth-Century Popular Monarchy and the Bond between Wilhelmina of the Netherlands and Her People in World War II.” Adams analyzed the reign of Queen Wilhelmina (r. 1890-1948) during the Second World War and discovered that an essential element of effective monarchy in modern democracies was the human connection between the people and the monarch. As European societies became increasingly democratic in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, this personal connection was ever more essential as it allowed the monarch to embody national identity. As a monarch-in-exile in Britain during World War II, Wilhelmina actively and effectively stepped into her role as the symbol of Dutch national identity. Her wartime radio broadcasts allowed her to connect with the occupied Netherlands, and her informal meetings with Engelandvaarders, a small group of Dutch citizens who escaped to Britain, established an even deeper human connection. Wilhelmina’s active role as a beacon of national identity in World War II was part of a changing role for twentieth-century monarchs, in which they emphasized a personal connection with their people as a way of providing effective royal leadership.

Terra presented a paper on “The 1775 Bermuda Gunpowder Plot: An Analysis of Its Historical and Cultural Significance.” He pointed out that while the island of Bermuda rarely comes to mind when one thinks about the American Revolutionary War, many Bermudian citizens see the war as a claim to fame. In August 1775, a small band of Bermudians, in an agreement with the American rebels, stole the island’s main gunpowder stock in return for desperately needed supplies from the Americans. The event, known as the 1775 Gunpowder Plot, has caused considerable debate owing to uncertainties about where the powder ended up and how the Americans used it. Terra discussed factors relevant to the plot such as the Continental Army’s need for gunpowder in 1775, the quantity of the Bermudian gunpowder involved, and ways in which the powder could have impacted the Revolution. To those who have claimed that Bermuda, through the Gunpowder Plot, saved the American Revolutionary War, Terra responded by stating that the claim was nothing but a myth. Terra asserted that the myth resulted from a Bermudian desire to give the island historical significance by claiming that it played a decisive role in the start of the decline of the British empire and the rise of one of the world’s greatest countries ever.

Adams won the award for the best undergraduate paper in world history at the conference.