![]() ![]() McCullough is not trying to tell the story of the American Revolution or even of the whole War of Independence. The corner had been turned.Ī British reader has to know a bit of history before starting this book. ![]() But after Trenton, the American public realised that they could win and must win. The war dragged on until the British surrender at Yorktown in 1781. They were anything but decisive in military terms. As soon as Howe's incredible decision was known, Washington snatched the opportunity for a 'brilliant stroke' he came back across the Delaware and won two small but dazzling victories over Hessian and British forces at Trenton and Princeton. The British never grasped that it was good publicity which kept Washington's small army in the field, by producing fresh flows of volunteer reinforcements. But his failure to take Philadelphia when he could was worse. In August, he had let the defeated American army escape after the battle of Brooklyn (or Long Island). He would go back to New York and mop up Philadelphia and the Yankee army the following spring. When Washington wrote those words, he did not know that General Howe, the British commander, had already decided that it was getting too cold to carry on fighting. ![]() David McCullough's account bears out the saying that this war was lost by the British rather than won by the Americans the book could have been subtitled 'Failures to Pursue'. ![]() But Washington was wrong, as he frequently was about military things. ![]()
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