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Hello, in January 1776 in Philadelphia an anonymous pamphlet was published entitled Common Sense.

Addressed to the inhabitants of America it sold 150,000 copies in the first few months

and it said proportionately, but the best selling book in American history.

At that time half the population had either read it or read about it.

The writer was Thomas Payne who'd arrived from England barely a year before.

Each 37 with nothing but a few piecemeal newspaper articles to his name.

He argued the colony should abandon all hope of resolving their disputes with Britain

and declare independence immediately.

He vigorously attacked Monarchy generally and George III in particular.

Many Americans are scandalised, more were inspired and for Payne's vision of America

and in America's independent future he's been called a founding father of the United States.

With me to discuss Thomas Payne's common sense are Kathleen Burke, Professor Emeritor of Modern

and Contemporary History at University College London, Nicholas Guiet, University Lecturer

in American History at the University of Cambridge and Peter Thompson, Associate Professor

of American History at the University of Oxford and Fellow of Centros College.

Kathy Burke, Thomas Payne was 37 when he left England for Philadelphia, where was he brought

up and what was he like at 37?

Well, he was born in Thetford, East Anglia in 1737.

His interesting because his mother was an Anglican daughter of a lawyer, 11 years older than

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