Abstract
James P.Myers Jr.has written an engrossing account integrating biography and exegesis in The Ordeal of Thomas Barton. That said, Myers flirts with hagiography as he argues for a reform of Barton's image from that of a possibly unprincipled young man, naive plagiarist, and propagandist to that of a well-respected minister and ultimately victim—a martyr, as Myers puts it,to the Revolution. Another key component of Myers's argument is Barton's significanceas an agent of church and empire on the frontier. Barton was essentially "a pro-prietary placeman"(37), and the crises of the 1750s to 1770s put such middle-men in extremely uncomfortable, even ethically untenable, positions. As such an establishment agent, Barton appears at times to have been simply a tool. Myers concludes, for instance, that Barton, despite his sympathetic portrayals of Native Americans and stated desire for missionary work among them, may have writtena pro–Paxton Boys screed because pushed to do so by proprietary and Church of England interests. Barton compromised his principals at that time, but according to Myers he redeemed himself in his own eyes—and those of his chronicler—by refusing to compromise his principles during the Revolution.