AFTER THE FACT - Assignment Example

After the Fact Silas Deane’s death was discussed in the historical account The Strange Case of Silas Deane. His life was a story of rags-to-riches and eventual demise. From being a son of a blacksmith, he went to study law at Yale, practiced his profession, married a rich widow, and became a merchant, and continued to be one after her death. He entered politics and earned a high rank position in the U.S. government in the midst of conflict between his country and England. His death was a mystery, pointing to suicide as his punishment to himself after he was convicted of treason of his mother country.

The prologue of the account, however, narrated Deane’s close connection with his personal aide, Edward Bancroft and Deane’s partnership with Bancroft in their sort of gambling escapades when he was exiled. Deane was alleged to have known of Bancroft being a double spy to both Britain and the U.S., and so, when Deane decided to come back to his country, he died aboard a ship. Though a conjecture, some evidences gathered by historians can link Bancroft’s fear of being revealed as a traitor and his thorough knowledge in poisons.

With this account, truth is defined as a product of careful analysis of evidences, and the apparent connections of them in order to make a logical and coherent conclusion. Top rail bias means that writing history is mired by prejudices and bias of affluent history authors who are the producers of most history books. Bottom rail means citing, for instance, a slave as a source of a historical research. It is difficult to be used as a reliable source of information knowing the biases present in every slave’s dependence to their lords (Davidson and Lytle 206).

Good sources are diverse, meaning they come from two different people, and must be first-hand. Moreover, any freedman’s point-of-view should not be taken by face-value. Sack’s method of investigation could have worked better because it did not employ any form of deceit, and it is an accuracy-driven method. An outside factor, such as race and inherent prejudices, plays a crucial role in a historical researching. Sack’s approach that entails thorough research and comparison of accounts works best.

Meanwhile, the case of the colorblind painter depicted a historical approach in finding a solution to blindness problem. This is equally true with historical research. Treating every reader as blind from history and the historian as well could make a history research free from biases and prejudices and will be even more effective.Work CitedDavidson, James West, and Mark Hamilton Lytle. “The View from the Bottom Rail.” After theFact: The Art of Historical Detection. New York: McGraw HillHumanities, 1999. 177-210. MPSAZ.org. Web. 14 Nov. 2012..