Revolutionary generation

"This book offers a collective biography of the 204 members of the Harvard College classes of 1771 through 1774, men whose lives intersected with the War for Independence and the other formative events of the founding years of the American Republic. The names of a few of these men are still familiar, including painter John Trumbull and Congressman Fisher Ames, but this study's principal importance lies in these schoolmates' shared experiences - experiences that were also common to a much wider group of youths who reached adulthood in the 1770s."--Jacket.