Today while preparing for my Renaissance class final and watching the history channel I found something curious that I had knew known before. I was watching "Decoded" this show which basically cracks codes and solves mysteries by this historical fiction novelist Brad Meltzer.
This episode was about the very first spy chain or organization in the U.S also the predecessor to the C.I.A called the Culper Ring. Apparently George Washington was the master of the ring. These "ordinary folk" were the intelligence or the spies and there were about 20 of them. They didn't fully know who they all were which was helpful in avoiding getting caught, these people couldn't snitch to Britain no matter what cause they did not know.
The used invisible ink to write messages. They had a number codes in order to decipher messages and only four were made. Apparently this ring was paramount to discourage Benedict Arnold from selling out the Americans.
The most intriging thing I learned was that no one knew about this until the 1930s. These people's identities where hidden so well that they literally took their secrets to the grave. Meltzer's group and I both did not understand why it wasn't taught in our high school history courses. It wasn't taught in my college course either. If it was such a major piece of the Revolutionary War then why wasn't it covered?
We literally won the war based on our collective minds verses muscle power. Why leave it out, doesn't that leave a huge chuck out of the puzzle? If history is the story of man and all stories have a beginning, middle and idealistically an ending then why is this detail missing?
Stories are intriguing they teach us lessons whether they are fact or fiction or embellished. These parables handed down to us allow us to live vicariously through those who came before. How would we have done or reacted to (insert historical event). Life is short. We learn through our experiences and shared stories or rather other history.
The story of the Culper Ring provides early innovations that we still use today. This story also teaches us the value of our minds, whether we agree with these actions or not. Also there is no such thing as defeat unless you otherwise claim it.
History after is a teacher who provides us with some great stories and poessess many storytellers.
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