The American Heritage History of the American Revolution

This heavily illustrated volume gives the Revolution a suitably grand retelling. First published in 1958, the text, by novelist and history popularizer Lancaster (with an introductory chapter by English historian J. H. Plumb), is a perceptive and rousing but fairly conventional military and political history, focused on central figures like the majestic Washington (""there was something in the way he sat his horse"") and epics like the Breeds Hill bloodbath, the debate over the Declaration of Independence and the Valley Forge ordeal. Its viewpoint is a triumphalist one, as the fractious colonists, offspring of English liberty and French Enlightenment philosophy, find common cause in opposition to British taxation and trade policy and are finally forged in the white-hot smithy of war into a nation--indeed, into a""new race"" of""tall men."" Lancaster does pay attention to the vicious and less edifying frontier strife between Patriots and their Loyalist and Indian foes, while a slightly apologetic foreword to this new edition by Thomas Fleming nods to modern multicultural sensibilities by mentioning the contributions of African Americans, women, Jews and Irishmen. To facilitate browsing and reference, the text is interspersed with bite-sized topical essays that recapitulate the main points of the narrative and cover special subjects like weapons and uniforms, camps and prisons and the birth of the industrial revolution. The whole is illustrated with numerous reproductions--most in color, but with a low production value--of period paintings, maps, cartoons and original documents. While somewhat old-fashioned, the book's generals-and-battles-and-orators approach covers the basics of the Revolution with excitement and flair, while conveying a sense of the monumental achievement of its makers.