It's just out this year. It's a good read, Ferling writes well, and he does the footnote thing religiously so it's serious history. It's got maps which make the story a bunch more understandable. It tells the standard story of the revolution, no Marxist class warfare riffs, no brand new interpretations of events. It's the right story, well told. Ferling picks things up in 1763, right after the French and Indian War. He goes thru the political buildup for independence. He shows how it took 12 years to sell the colonists on the idea of kicking out King George, bidding the British Empire farewell, and giving up their English citizenship. The breach was egged on by Parliament, which spent those 12 years throwing their weight around and trying to show the Americans who was boss.
The British Army was more professional than the Americans, the British could do the Column Left, Halt, Right Face, maneuver to shake a marching column out into a fighting line, and their officers could read the terrain and find unprotected flanks the the green Americans didn't even know existed.
But when the Americans could pick their spot, get set up, and had a good plan, they fought like tigers and inflicted dreadful casualties on the British. Bunker Hill. Trenton, Kings Mountain, and Cowpens. all showed how to blow a lot of Redcoats away in very short order.
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