American Revolution

Happy Independence Day!  Here are 10 books on the American Revolution to enjoy this 4th of July.

Band of Giants: The Amateur Soldiers Who Won America's Independence by Jack Kelly - Band of Giants brings to life the founders who fought for our independence in the Revolutionary War. Jefferson, Adams, and Franklin are known to all; men like Morgan, Greene, and Wayne are less familiar. Yet the dreams of the politicians and theorists only became real because fighting men were willing to take on the grim, risky, brutal work of war. We know Fort Knox, but what about Henry Knox, the burly Boston bookseller who took over the American artillery at the age of 25? Eighteen counties in the United States commemorate Richard Montgomery, but do we know that this revered martyr launched a full-scale invasion of Canada? The soldiers of the American Revolution were a diverse lot: merchants and mechanics, farmers and fishermen, paragons and drunkards. Most were ardent amateurs. Even George Washington, assigned to take over the army around Boston in 1775, consulted books on military tactics. Here, Jack Kelly vividly captures the fraught condition of the war--the bitterly divided populace, the lack of supplies, the repeated setbacks on the battlefield, and the appalling physical hardships. That these inexperienced warriors could take on and defeat the superpower of the day was one of the remarkable feats in world history.

Blood of Tyrants: George Washington & the Forging of the Presidency by Logan Beirne - Blood of Tyrants reveals the surprising details of our Founding Fathers' approach to government and this history's impact on today. Delving into the forgotten--and often lurid--facts of the Revolutionary War, Logan Beirne focuses on the nation's first commander in chief, George Washington, as he shaped the very meaning of the United States Constitution in the heat of battle. Key episodes illustrate how the Founders dealt with thorny wartime issues: Who decides war strategy? When should we use military tribunals over civilian trials? Should we inflict harsh treatment on enemy captives if it means saving American lives? How do we protect citizens' lights when the nation is struggling to defend itself? Beirne finds evidence in previously-unexplored documents such as General Washington's letters debating torture, an eyewitness account of the military tribunal that executed a British prisoner, Founders' letters warning against government debt, and communications pointing to a power struggle between Washington and the Continental Congress. Vivid stories from the Revolution frame Washington's pivotal role in the drafting of the Constitution. The Founders saw the first American commander in chief as the template for all future presidents: a leader who would fiercely defend Americans' rights and liberties against all forms of aggression. Blood of Tyrants pulls the reader directly into the scenes, filling the void in our understanding of the presidency and our ingenious Founders' pragmatic approach to issues we still face today.

The British Are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton, 1775-1777 by Rick Atkinson - Rick Atkinson, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning An Army at Dawn and two other masterly books about World War II, has long been admired for his unparalleled ability to write deeply researched, stunningly vivid narrative history. Now he turns his attention to a new war, and in the initial volume of the Revolution Trilogy he tells the story of the first twenty months of the bloody struggle to shake free of King George's shackles. From the battles at Lexington and Concord in spring 1775 to those at Trenton and Princeton in winter 1777, the ragtag Continental Army takes on the world's most formidable fighting force and gradually finds the will and the way to win. It is a riveting saga populated by singular characters: Henry Knox, the former bookseller with an uncanny understanding of how best to deploy artillery; Nathaniel Greene, the blue-eyed bumpkin who becomes one of America's greatest battle captains; Benjamin Franklin, the self-made man who proves himself the nation's greatest diplomat; George Washington, the commander-in-chief who learns the difficult art of leadership amid the fire and smoke of the battlefield. And the British are here, too: we see the war through their eyes and their gunsights, and as a consequence the mortal conflict between the redcoats and the rebels is all the more compelling. Full of fresh details and untold stories, The British Are Coming gives stirring new life to the first act of our country's creation drama. It is a tale of heroes and knaves, of sacrifice and blunder, of redemption and profound suffering. But once begun, the war for independence can have only one of two outcomes: death or victory.

Igniting the American Revolution: 1773-1775 by Derek W. Beck - The Revolutionary War did not begin with the Declaration of Independence, but several years earlier in 1773. In this gripping history, Derek W. Beck reveals the full story of the war before American independence -- from both sides. Spanning the years 1773-1775 and drawing on new material from meticulous research and previously unpublished documents, letters, and diaries, Igniting the American Revolution sweeps readers from the rumblings that led to the Boston Tea Party to the halls of Parliament -- where Ben Franklin was almost run out of England for pleading on behalf of the colonies -- to that fateful Expedition to Concord which resulted in the shot heard round the world. With exquisite detail and keen insight, Beck brings revolutionary America to life in all its enthusiastic and fiery patriotic fervor, painting a nuanced portrait of the perspectives, ambitions, people, and events on both the British and the American sides that eventually would lead to the convention in Philadelphia on July 4, 1776. Captivating, provocative and inspiring, Igniting the American Revolution is the definitive history of these landmark years in our nation's history, whose events irrevocably altered the future not only of the United States and England, but the whole world.

Independence: The Tangled Roots of the American Revolution by Thomas P. Slaughter - "What do we mean by the Revolution?" John Adams asked Thomas Jefferson in 1815. "The war? That was no part of the Revolution. It was only an effect and consequence of it." As the distinguished historian Thomas P. Slaughter shows in this landmark book, the long process of revolution reached back more than a century before 1776, and it touched on virtually every aspect of the colonies' laws, commerce, social structures, religious sentiments, family ties, and political interests. And Slaughter's comprehensive work makes clear that the British who chose to go to North America chafed under imperial rule from the start, vigorously disputing many of the colonies' founding charters.
When the British said the Americans were typically "independent," they meant to disparage them as lawless and disloyal. But the Americans insisted on their moral courage and political principles, and regarded their independence as a great virtue, as they regarded their love of freedom and their loyalty to local institutions. Over the years, their struggles to define this independence took many forms, and Slaughter's compelling narrative takes us from New England and Nova Scotia to New York and Pennsylvania, and south to the Carolinas, as colonists resisted unsympathetic royal governors, smuggled to evade British duties on imported goods (tea was only one of many), and, eventually, began to organize for armed uprisings.
Britain, especially after its victories over France in the 1750s, was eager to crush these rebellions, but the Americans' opposition only intensified, as did dark conspiracy theories about their enemies--whether British, Native American, or French.
In Independence, Slaughter resets and clarifies the terms in which we may understand this remarkable evolution, showing how and why a critical mass of colonists determined that they could not be both independent and subject to the British Crown. By 1775-76, they had become revolutionaries--going to war only reluctantly, as a last-ditch means to preserve the independence that they cherished as a birthright.

Killing England: The Brutal Struggle for American Independence by Bill O'Reilly & Martin Dugard - Told through the eyes of George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and Great Britain's King George III, Killing England chronicles the path to independence in gripping detail, taking the reader from the battlefields of America to the royal courts of Europe. What started as protest and unrest in the colonies soon escalated to a world war with devastating casualties. O'Reilly and Dugard recreate the war's landmark battles, including Bunker Hill, Long Island, Saratoga, and Yorktown, revealing the savagery of hand-to-hand combat and the often brutal conditions under which these brave American soldiers lived and fought. Also here is the reckless treachery of Benedict Arnold and the daring guerrilla tactics of the "Swamp Fox" Francis Marion.

Our Lives, Our Fortunes and Our Sacred Honor: The Forging of American Independence, 1774-1776 by Richard R. Beeman - In 1768, Philadelphia physician Benjamin Rush stood before the empty throne of King George III, overcome with emotion as he gazed at the symbol of America's connection with England. Eight years later, he became one of the fifty-six men to sign the Declaration of Independence, severing America forever from its mother country. Rush was not alone in his radical decision--many of those casting their votes in favor of independence did so with a combination of fear, reluctance, and even sadness.
In Our Lives, Our Fortunes and Our Sacred Honor, acclaimed historian Richard R. Beeman examines the grueling twenty-two-month period between the meeting of the Continental Congress on September 5, 1774 and the audacious decision for independence in July of 1776. As late as 1774, American independence was hardly inevitable--indeed, most Americans found it neither desirable nor likely. When delegates from the thirteen colonies gathered in September, they were, in the words of John Adams, "a gathering of strangers." Yet over the next two years, military, political, and diplomatic events catalyzed a change of unprecedented magnitude: the colonists' rejection of their British identities in favor of American ones. In arresting detail, Beeman brings to life a cast of characters, including the relentless and passionate John Adams, Adams' much-misunderstood foil John Dickinson, the fiery political activist Samuel Adams, and the relative political neophyte Thomas Jefferson, and with profound insight reveals their path from subjects of England to citizens of a new nation.

Revolution Song: The Story of America's Founding in Six Remarkable Lives by Russell Shorto - "In his epic new book, Russell Shorto takes us back to the founding of the American nation, drawing on diaries, letters and autobiographies to flesh out six lives that cast the era in a fresh new light. They include an African man who freed himself and his family from slavery, a rebellious young woman who abandoned her abusive husband to chart her own course, and a certain Mr. Washington, who was admired for his social graces but harshly criticized for his often-disastrous military strategy. Through these lives we understand that the revolution was fought over the meaning of individual freedom, a philosophical idea that became a force for violent change. A powerful narrative and a brilliant defense of American values, Revolution Song makes the compelling case that the American Revolution is still being fought today and that its ideals are worth defending.

The Strategy of Victory: How General George Washington Won the American Revolution by Thomas J. Fleming - Led by the Continental Congress, the Americans almost lost their war for independence because their military thinking was badly muddled. The embryo nation narrowly escaped from the disastrous results of these misconceptions thanks to the levelheaded intelligence of one man: General George Washington. Following the flush of small victories in 1775, patriot leaders were convinced that the key to victory was the homegrown militia--local men defending their families and homes. Washington knew that having and maintaining an army of regular professional soldiers was the only way to win independence. He fought bitterly with the leaders in Congress over the creation of a regular army. In the end, he and his army prevailed. In Strategy of Victory, prolific historian Thomas Fleming examines the battles that created American independence, revealing how the strategy of a professional army, backed by a corps of citizen soldiers determined to fight for their freedom, worked on the battlefield, securing victory, independence and a lasting peace for the young nation.

Whirlwind: The American Revolution and the War That Won It by John E. Ferling - Written in the authoritative and narrative-driven style that has made his books critical and commercial successes, John Ferling's Whirlwind will become the definitive history of the American Revolution for our time. This master historian illuminates the years 1763 to 1783--from the end of the French and Indian War that left England triumphant in North America to the signing of the Treaty of Paris and the final departure of British troops from New York City. Embracing characters both celebrated and unknown, Ferling chronicles the myriad and complex events and contentious viewpoints that drove Americans in their insurgency against Great Britain and sustained them in the seemingly quixotic belief that they could win their independence. He takes us to the halls of power in Parliament and the streets of London to view the Revolution from British perspectives. He presents the individual battles--from Lexington and Concord to Yorktown---in a fresh and dramatic new light. With a wide scope and insight, John Ferling brings the most important event in America's long history to a new generation of American readers.