People in History Sample Answers

George Washington (1732-1799)

Born in Virginia, he was descended from an English immigrant family. His father was a tobacco grower. George had little formal education. He served as an officer in Army fighting against the French in the Americas.

He inherited his family estate Mount Vernon, and became a wealthy tobacco grower. Like other planters Washington became alarmed by the repressive actions of the British crown and Parliament.(Quartering Act, Stamp Act.)

He and other planters called for a boycott of British imports. He was elected to the First and Second Continental Conference and when war broke out he was chosen Commander in Chief of the Continental Army. During the War of Independence he had several military successes.(Trenton; Princeton and Yorktown.)
The Colonists had successfully joined together to fight the British and now that they had won Washington urged them to stay together to form a National Government.

He played no major role in drawing up the Constitution. This objectivity probably helped him to be chosen as the First American President in 1788 and again in 1792 until 1797. His honesty and sense of priority allowed the new Government of a new country survive the traumas of its birth. He retired to his Estate in Virginia and died in 1799.

Theobald Wolfe Tone

Theobald Wolfe Tone was a Dublin-born Protestant. A person's religion was very important in the 18th century. There were three main religions: Catholics, Presbyterians and Anglicans. The Penal Laws discriminated Catholics, they left them poor and powerless. Presbyterians were also slightly discriminated by the Anglicans as they would not allow them to sit in government jobs. Anglicans were divided into two groups, The Protestant Ascendancy, who controlled almost all the land and jobs and then the rest who had little wealth or power. Wolfe Tone belonged to this group.

Wolfe Tone belonged to the Church of Ireland but his family were not rich enough to be part of the Protestant Ascendancy. He studied law in Trinity College, but was more interested in politics. When the French revolution broke out, he welcomed it, hoping for "liberty, equality and fraternity" in Ireland too. In 1791 Presbyterians in Belfast set up a club to work for these ideas. Tone suggested they campaign against the Penal Laws. To convince them, he wrote a short book called "An Argument on behalf of the Catholics of Ireland". In it, Tone said that religious divisions were bad for Ireland. Many people were impressed by what he wrote and he was invited by Belfast Presbyterians him to join them in setting up the Society of United Irishmen.

The aims of the United Irishmen were to unite Irish people of all religions, reform the Irish parliament and reduce the power of the British government in Ireland. At first they worked peacefully for these aims, but in 1793 Britain went to war with France. The British thought that anyone who sympathised with French ideas was dangerous and watched the United Irishmen closely. When they found Tone talking to a French spy they forced him to leave Ireland for America and outlawed the UI.

New leaders took over after Tone left. They turned the UI into a secret society and planned a rebellion to set up an Irish republic. Tone knew they would need outside help. He went to France to persuade the French to send an army to Ireland. They listened to him and sent an army of 15,000 headed for Ireland. In December 1796 the army set out but their ships rant into terrible storms and had to go back to France.

This frightened the Ascendancy and the British government. They decided to destroy the UI before another French army could arrive. They used spies to uncover their plans and introduced a reign of terror in Ulster & Leinster. This then led to rebellions in Leinster, Wexford and Ulster which were unsuccessful. In Paris, Wolfe Tone at last persuaded the French to send more troops but they came too late to help the rebels. 1,100 men landed in Killala in Co. Mayo. Thousands of local people joined them. They defeated a small British army at Castlebar but then lost to a much larger force at Ballinamuck. A little later a small French fleet arrived in Lough Swilly in Donegal. Wolfe Tone was on board. The British navy captured them. Tone was sent to Dublin where he was tried and sentenced to hang. The asked to be shot like a soldier and when that was refused he committed suicide.

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A monk in an early Christian monastery in Ireland

My name is Brother John and I live in a monastery called Clonmacnoise near the River Shannon. I joined the monastery when I was 16 years old and I was called a novice. The man in charge of the monastery is called the abbot. After five years I took vows of poverty, obedience and chastity. I was given a brown habit to wear.

The largest building in our monastery is the church. All the monks live in small beehive cells made of stone. We have also built a very tall round tower in our monastery. We are afraid of being attacked by the Vikings. If an attack takes place we all go into the tower for protection and bring all our precious goods with us. The most precious goods we have in our monastery are the silver and gold chalices and crosses, which were made by monks with special craft skills.

I rise before dawn every day of the year and spend the first part of the day praying. My main job in the monastery is that of a scribe. I spend many hours decorating manuscripts, which contain stories from the Bible. I make all my own coloured inks and paints and the material on which I write is called vellum. I use special pens made from the feathers of a goose called a quill.

The monks in the monastery have many different jobs. Some work on the land while others do all the cooking. One monk carves special high crosses and another uses silver and gold to make beautiful chalices.

Some of the monks have left the monastery to go overseas to Europe to spread the Christian religion. These monks are called missionaries and they have become followers of a monk called Columbanus. I expect to stay in this monastery until I die and I don’t think I’ll ever see any of my family again.

Martin Luther: A named religious reformer at the time of the Reformation

During the time of the Reformation a very important religious reformer was Martin Luther. Martin was born in Germany and became an Augustinian monk. He had an important job as a university professor in the city of Wittenberg. He was very concerned about saving his soul and getting into heaven. He studied the Bible closely and eventually he became convinced that only faith in God would save him.

In the year 1517 a monk called John Tetzel came to Wittenberg selling indulgences for the Pope and some of money was to be used to build St. Peter’s in Rome. Many people were frightened into buying indulgences and this made Luther very angry. He decided to do something in protest and wrote 95 theses, which he nailed to the main church door. This was later translated into German and printed and his ideas spread rapidly.

The Pope heard of Luther’s protest and he sent a letter called a Papal Bull ordering Luther to stop but Luther burned the Pope’s letter in public. The Pope could have excommunicated Luther for this. Next the Emperor of Germany got involved and a special meeting took place called the Diet of Worms. Luther spoke at the meeting and absolutely refused to change his views. Then Emperor Charles V condemned Luther as a heretic and this meant that his life was in danger. At this stage Prince Frederick of Saxony came to the aid of Luther and he hid Luther in his castle for nearly a year. During his time in the castle he translated the old Latin Bible into German and he also began to form a new Christian religion.

In this new Lutheran church the Bible became central; there were only two sacraments – baptism and communion; all Church services were in the language of the region; there were ministers instead of priests and they were allowed to marry. The new Lutheran religion spread rapidly all over Germany and many princes became Lutheran. They became known as Protestants and very soon deep divisions developed between the Catholic Church and the Lutheran Church. This led to wars of religion that lasted for over nine years.

A person living in Ancient Rome

My name is Claudia and I live in the city of Rome, which is the main city of our great empire. Our ruler is called an emperor and the Roman Empire stretches all the way to the border with Scotland. My father is a general in our great Roman army and he is in charge of very well trained professional soldiers. They use weapons such as pila, swords and shields.

My father is well paid so we live in a beautiful domus near the centre of Rome. It has a central room called the atrium and there is a beautiful enclosed garden – the peristylium. All the walls are painted with beautiful murals and there are mosaics on the floors. My father is the head of our family and I attend school each day. We begin very early and finish at noon. The main subjects are maths, writing and reading. I wear a tunic every day and wealthy men such as my father wear a toga in public, while my mother wears a stola. Our main meal of the day takes place in the evening and is called the cena. Some people overeat and get sick into a vomitorium. My family own slaves and they do all the work in our house such as preparing and serving the food. Some slaves also work as builders, street sweepers and helping the army.

The centre of our city is called the Forum and this is a very busy market place. There are also some very important buildings located here such as the Courts, Temples, and Senate house. It is a very good place to meet people and to shop. For entertainment there are many choices in Rome. We can go to the Great Chariot Races held at the Circus Maximus. The public baths are a really good place to meet people. Then there are the Games at the Colosseum, which are usually exciting gladiator contests. Religion is a very important part of our lives and we have statues of our important Gods in our homes. I pray to the God of war called Mars and I ask him to protect all our soldiers fighting for the Roman Empire.

A factory owner during the Industrial Revolution in Britain

My name is Robert Smith and I own a large textile factory in the city of Bolton in Lancashire. My very first factory was in the countryside because I needed to use waterpower from the nearby river. My new factory uses steam power so I need lots of coal as well as a supply of water. Many people have moved into the city from the countryside in search of work because of all the changes as a result of the Enclosure Acts passed by our government.

Over five hundred workers are employed in the factory and they are mostly women and children. There are also a few men employed as overseers and engineers. They look after the huge machines that produce large amounts of cotton cloth every day. I import the raw cotton from India, which is a part of our British Empire and the cloth is then exported all over the Empire and that is how I am able to make a profit.

Over the past 20 years the London Parliament has passed many new laws called the Factory Acts and now all my women workers can only work 10 hours per day and we are not allowed to employ any children under the age of 9 years. Most of my workers live in red brick terraced housing that I have built close to their place of work because I want to ensure that they get here in time for the 6am start of the work day. They pay rent to me. A few years ago there were many problems with the living conditions of the workers. Many of them complained of diseases such as cholera, typhus and TB. However, many improvements have taken place. Health boards were created all over the big towns and cities to make sure that the streets were cleaned and to ensure that water was piped into homes and that sewers were built. There have also been developments in medicine, which have also improved the lives of my workers.

Because I am a factory owner I don’t have to live in the city but in a large house in the country. I send my family to public school at Eton. I am not a supporter of the workers getting too much education as this could lead to them getting ideas that may cause trouble for the factory owners such as me.

Christopher Columbus: A named leader on a voyage during the Age of Exploration

A leader during the Age of Exploration was Christopher Columbus. Even though he sailed for Spain, he was born in Italy in the port city of Genoa. As a young man he dreamed of being a sailor and he was very influenced by a book on the travels of Marco Polo to China.

Columbus was convinced the world was round and he decided that he would travel west to reach China and the Indies. First, he had to look for sponsorship and he eventually got the support of Queen Isabella of Spain. She helped to fund three ships and Columbus set sail from the port of Palos in Spain in August 1492. Columbus was on board the flagship, which was called the Santa Maria. The other ships were the Nina and the Pinta. The first stop made on the voyage was the Canary Islands in order to make repairs and bring on fresh food supplies.

In September 1492 the three ships sailed west into the Atlantic. After a few weeks of sailing some of the sailors grew nervous and Columbus promised to turn back if they did not reach land within a couple of days. Then in October 1492, the ships reached an island, which Columbus called San Salvador. He called the people who lived there ‘Indians’. Columbus spent the following weeks exploring the islands of the region. The flagship sank and the timber was used to build a fort on the island that Columbus called Hispaniola.

In March 1493, Columbus arrived back in Spain to a hero’s welcome and brought with him some native people as well as products from his travels. Columbus made three more voyages but ended his career in shame as he was arrested for treating the native people with cruelty.

A farm labourer during the Agricultural Revolution

My name is Stephen Jones and I live in Norfolk in England. Over the past few years a huge number of changes have taken places in farming. Before the Agricultural Revolution most people lived in small villages and grew crops in fields scattered here and there and reared farm animals on the village common land. However, there were lots of problems. We all had narrow strips of land and sometimes farm animals walked all over our crops. Also all the farm work had to be done by hand and this made the work really slow.

However, when people began to move to the new cities to work in big factories great changes took place in the countryside. The government passed a law, which was called the Enclosure Act and this meant that farmers built fences and ditches and all their land was in one large unit. Another major change has been the introduction of a system of crop rotation, which began here in Norfolk and this means that the soil is always kept enriched and does not get worn out. Our method is that we plant a different crop in each field every year and in one year we let clover grow in the field as this is good for the soil.

Another change was that new machines have been invented to make farming much easier but it also means that there is less need for farm labourers. One of these machines was invented by a man called Jethro Tull and it is called the seed drill, which makes it possible to grow more grain because all the seeds are properly covered by soil when planting takes place. Another machine that was invented was the mechanical reaper, which was pulled by two horses and this could do the work of a few men in just a few hours. Lastly, another big change is that new and better breeds of cattle and sheep have been brought to the countryside, which have more meat and produce more milk.

A supporter of an independence movement in a named African or Asian country after 1945 (India)

I am a supporter of the independence movement in India. For nearly two hundred years up to the end of WWII, India was a huge country in Asia ruled by Britain and the representative of the British monarch in India was called the Viceroy. Many British politicians referred to India as ‘the jewel in the crown’.

However, from the 1920s more and more people in India began to demand independence and a man called Gandhi became our leader and he had his own political party. In the 1930s the British Government was forced to give India a form of Home Rule but Gandhi and many others called for full independence. After WWII the new British Labour Government wanted to give India ‘dominion status’ just like Canada had obtained.

However, the new Viceroy, Lord Mountbatten, realised that there were major religious divisions in the country between Hindus and Muslims and that an independent partitioned India was the only solution. Muslim leaders had been demanding a separate state called Pakistan. Lord Mountbatten was responsible for the transfer of power to an Indian Government. India was also divided into two parts and the Muslim part became independent Pakistan. India and Pakistan became independent in August 1947. However, there was a huge amount of bloodshed and violence as a result of this, which lasted for many years and millions of people died or became refugees.