NEWPORT, R.I. (Dec. 6, 2016) – Salve Regina University students working in collaboration with the Middletown Historical Society have completed a 365-page investigative analysis of the Siege of Newport, a 1778 battle fought from opposing hills in Middletown that became one of the largest military operations of the Revolution. The historic effort to retake Newport – known as the Battle of Rhode Island – was the first joint military operation of the newly formed alliance between the French and the Colonials.
Printed at Salve Regina University, “Siege of British Forces in Newport County by Colonial and French in August of 1778” is the first in-depth analysis of the battlefield that could very well have been the site where the Revolutionary War was won.
The document is now available in public libraries and in historical society archives throughout Aquidneck Island, as well as in electronic format via the university’s McKillop Library digital commons repository. The research was commissioned by the National Park Service’s American Battlefield Protection Program, which awarded a $67,200 grant to the Middletown Historical Society in summer 2015.
The Salve Regina students, under the guidance of Cultural and Historic Preservation Assistant Professor Jon Marcoux and History Professor John Quinn, conducted much of the work as part of the collaborative research team. On Monday (Dec. 4), Kenneth Walsh, the Middletown Historical Society Research Team’s Principal Investigator, joined with university faculty, students and alumni to formally present copies of the completed report to Jane Gerety, RSM, Salve Regina president, and Scott Zeman, provost/vice president for academic affairs.