The Original Volunteers

Witherspoon Lecture Series
Featuring Dr. Michael Lynch
The Original Volunteers: Overmountain Men in the Southern Campaign

Discussing Appalachian frontiersmen’s involvement in the Revolution, why and how they mobilized to make a significant contribution to victory in the South—and why there were limits to that mobilization.
Michael Lynch is director of the Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum at Lincoln Memorial University in Harrogate, TN, home to one of the world’s largest collections of Lincoln and Civil War material. He and his team recently completed an award-winning, multimillion-dollar renovation of the exhibit galleries. He received his graduate education in history at the University of Tennessee, and his research focuses on the southern backcountry in the American Revolution.